The Clean Cooking Quest: It’s Time for the International Energy Agency (IEA) to Fight for Africa – Not Against it

 

The U.S. has intensified pressure on the International Energy Agency (IEA) – signaling that it could withdraw from the institution unless it refocuses on its founding mandate of safeguarding global energy security.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said Washington is not satisfied with the Paris-based agency’s current direction, arguing that its modelling and outlooks have become overly shaped by climate ideology at the expense of practical energy realities. He was direct in his messaging when he said that the IEA must return to prioritizing energy access and solvable clean cooking solutions.

For years, African leaders and private-sector stakeholders have argued that the IEA drifted from its original purpose – becoming increasingly politicized in its outlooks and instrumental in shaping restrictive financing narratives around oil and gas. The African Energy Chamber (AEC) has consistently maintained that this shift has had real consequences for developing economies, contributing to capital flight from African hydrocarbons and slowing the continent’s ability to tackle widespread energy poverty. If the IEA is now reassessing its position, the question is whether this represents genuine reform – or political expediency under mounting global pressure.

A History of Weaponizing Energy Outlooks  

The IEA has politicized its outlooks and adopted an anti-oil and gas agenda that directly undermined African development ambitions for years. Its 2021 net-zero roadmap – updated in 2025 – became a weapon used by financiers and multilateral institutions to restrict capital flows into Africa’s energy sector. Some of the objectives include no new investment for fossil fuel supply after 2021 and sales of fossil fuel boilers after 2025. It also condemns international combustion engine car sales after 2035, targeting 60% electric car sales and 50% electric heavy trucks from 2035.

These steps assume a lot about the state of the world – assumptions that are faulty, especially for Africa. For one, it will require universal energy access by 2030 – including electricity and clean cooking. With approximately 592 million Africans currently without this access, the continent is going to be hard-pressed to flip that switch in less than 10 years.

The IEA’s roadmap also relies on unprecedented investments in renewables – a substantial boost in clean energy investments from the $1 trillion made over the last five years all the way up to $5 trillion annually by 2030 – and cooperation from policymakers who are unified in their efforts. In this idyllic partnership, Africa’s Western counterparts talk a good game. But the fact is, to date, these same Western countries have invested little to no funding into Africa’s renewables space. To our dismay even the international oil companies that have tried to accept the IEA’s publicity stunt have little or no renewable projects in Africa.

OPEC wrote in response to IEA’s roadmap release that “For many developing countries, the pathway to net zero without international assistance is not clear. Technical and financial support is needed to ensure deployment of key technologies and infrastructure. Without greater international co‐operation, global CO2 emissions will not fall to net zero by 2050.”

The damage of the roadmap has been profound. Global financiers such as BNP Paribas and HSBC halted all new oil and gas financing while institutions such as Barclays, Nedbank and Deutsche Bank moved to selectively finance projects. In 2019, the World Bank also announced that it will stop direct investments in upstream oil and gas. When African countries were fighting for the development of strategic gas resources, one of the continent’s biggest institutional opponents was the IEA.  

“A bank should evaluate investment in an African oil field based on a project’s viability and associated risk, just as it would for a Norwegian, British or American project. Yet they don’t. This is precisely why the AEC plans to hold several banks legally accountable for promoting financial apartheid in the energy sector,” states NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman, AEC.

The Clean Cooking Challenge

With over 900 million people in Africa living without access to clean cooking solutions, addressing the problem of energy security is no longer an isolated challenge – it’s a strategic imperative. If Africa were to listen to the IEA, there would be no investment to address this challenge. Europe would not gain access to African gas supplies, making projects such as Angola LNG, Congo LNG, Greater Tortue Ahmeyim in Senegal/Mauritania, Equatorial Guinea’s Gas Mega Hub and Algerian production facilities obsolete. At a time when Mozambique LNG is resuming and Libya, Egypt and Nigeria are looking to produce more, IEA recommendations could prove catastrophic for Africa’s clean cooking quest.

Delivering remarks during the IEA’s 2026 Ministerial this week, Secretary Wright underscored that with $4 billion invested annually, the world can accelerate the rollout of clean cooking solutions and lift nearly two billion people out of energy poverty. While the IEA should be at the forefront of this drive, Secretary Wright highlighted how a focus on climate change has redirected critical financing away from hydrocarbons.

“The world today spends $1 trillion in the name of fighting climate change – collectively over $10 trillion in the last 20 years. What has been the upside of that? Only 2.6% of global energy comes from solar, wind, batteries and the increased transmission lines to promote them. This has only had meaningful penetration in rich countries,” he said.

A 2024 report by U.S. Senator John Barrasso further condemns the IEA for its renewable approach, arguing that the organization is increasingly responsible for feeding the unrealistic view that emerging economies can develop using only renewables. This shift began in 2020 when the IEA ceased creating energy market forecasts based on actual demand and decided to focus exclusively on hypothetical scenarios aligned with extreme emissions reduction targets.

This goes against the very mandate by which the IEA was established. Following an oil crisis and spike in prices in 1974, the IEA was established to ensure reliable, affordable and secure energy supplies worldwide. The organization’s recent history has contradicted this mandate.

“Africa will not make energy poverty history by abandoning the very resources that can fund its development. Oil and gas are not the problem – underdevelopment is. Organizations such as the IEA have played a central role in restricting financing, politicizing fossil fuels and impacting African energy development. That needs to stop,” adds Ayuk.

A Step in the Right Direction

Despite its history of inaction, the IEA seems to be moving in the right direction, announcing that it will host the Clean Cooking Alliance (CCA) – launched in 2010 – to tackle the global clean cooking crisis. The IEA will partner with governments and industry to accelerate universal clean cooking access, integrating the CCA within the IEA. The U.S. is also ramping-up its clean cooking support. Secretary Wright announced the launch of a Clean Cooking Accelerator Program to help build infrastructure to enable faster deployment of clean cooking solutions – focusing primarily on Africa. While these efforts are notable, much more needs to be done.

“Reform at the IEA must go beyond press releases. It must include a recalibration of outlooks to reflect differentiated development pathways, a rejection of blanket investment bans and an acknowledgment that African hydrocarbons are compatible with global climate goals,” Ayuk stated. “The AEC believes that Secretary Wright needs to put more teeth on his clean cooking and energy poverty plan. The African private sector will fund it. We don’t want aid – we want partnerships.”

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of African Energy Chamber.