Market Research on Productive Use Leveraging Solar Energy (PULSE)

An Emerging Market for Off-Grid Solar’s Newest Frontier: PULSE

Ongoing innovation in technology and distribution models continues to be a hallmark of the off-grid solar sector. Having already led to hundreds of millions of people benefitting from off grid solar products ranging from lanterns to solar home systems (SHS), products are now developing along the sector’s newest frontier – productive uses leveraging solar energy (PULSE). These can provide livelihoods for off-grid households and micro-enterprises across the agricultural, industrial, commercial, and public sectors.

A market for these new applications is emerging, and is explored in our new report, “The Market Opportunity for Productive Use Leveraging Solar Energy (PULSE) in Sub-Saharan Africa.” This report provides an overview of the market for PULSE micro-applications, which can be powered by standalone solar systems of one kilowatt or less. We narrowed the scope to products that largely overlap in size with the off-grid household solar sector in order to explore the opportunity to catalyse growth in the PULSE market and produce similar results to those achieved Lighting Global’s country programs. The micro-PULSE segment represents a natural extension for off-grid manufacturers and suppliers that have achieved great success in expanding energy access in rural areas. Geographically, the focus of the report is on sub-Saharan Africa with a deeper dive on Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Cote d’Ivoire. It seeks to inform the strategy of industry, government, and development actors and to catalyze the market for PULSE solutions across Africa.

The complete study, which the report summarizes, is also available below.