1. Context and motivation/rationale

Knowledge and understanding of the dynamics of energy transitions has come largely from the Global North, especially the EU, which has been at the forefront of developing technologies and policies to source energy from renewables and mitigate climate change (European Commission, 2019), even though this transition has been progressing at uneven speeds among EU member states (P´erez, de la, Scholten, & Stege, 2019). Although not as much is known or has been done about ‘clean’ energy transitions in Africa as compared to the EU experience, interest in this topic is growing in both policy and academic circles (Broto, 2017; International Renewable Energy Agency, 2019). Pressure to diversify energy sources and enhance energy access to promote technological innovation, competitiveness, and economic growth in Africa, concerns over greenhouse gas emissions and utopian anticipation of a post-fossil fuel future, and growing economic uncertainty in a post-COVID era have invigorated renewable energy policy initiatives on the continent. As with the EU, progress in Africa has been uneven, policy paths have varied among different countries, and some parts of the continent have been less intensively studied than others.

As a country whose fossil fuel resources are marginal (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2019), Morocco depends heavily on oil imports to meet its energy needs. High energy import bills, rising electricity demand, and funding, especially from International Financial Organizations (IFOs) such as the World Bank and the EU, have prompted the development of alternative reliable and sustainable energy sources (El Gharras & Menichetti, 2018) through such projects as the Noor Ouarzazate, described as the “world’s largest concentrated solar system” (CNN, 2019) and the Noor Midelt, described as the “world’s first advanced hybridization of concentrated solar power (CSP) and photovoltaic (PV) technologies” (Masdar, 2019). In addition to these practical feats, Morocco is also playing important political/policy roles in different sustainable energy development initiatives, such as its leadership of the United Nations-launched international coalition based on South-South Cooperation to accelerate access to sustainable energy in least-developed and developing countries (Bakkoury, 2020). Also, alongside prominent EU countries such as Germany, Spain, France and Portugal, Morocco is part of the Sustainable Electricity Trade (SET) Roadmap for cross-regional integration of energy systems that would allow the exportation of surplus renewable electricity produced in one country to a nearby country with lower production levels in order to equalize fluctuating supply and demand (European Commission, 2017). Finally, Morocco is also providing practical support towards South-South Cooperation by providing capacity-building and technical assistance programmes to help develop renewable energy projects for about 20 countries, mostly African (Bakkoury, 2020). Against the above backdrop, we believe that West Africa, a region that has faced acute energy access challenges but has also embarked on a regional coordinated ‘clean energy’ initiative, has important lessons to learn from Morocco’s example as a reference model in renewable energy development in Africa.