The island of St. Helena would like to reduce the majority diesel fuel share of its power mix, a dependency that results in high electricity retail prices and causes an inevitable environmental impact. To this end, the government approved the St. Helena Sustainable Development Plan (SDP) 2012/13-2014/15, which established the objective of minimizing environmental impact and proposed to increase the share of renewable energy generation. The SDP targets were for 75% of the island’s electricity to come from renewable sources by March 2016, increasing to 100% by March 2017. In order to meet these very ambitious goals, a technical solution needed to be established without delay. In parallel, the financial viability of the technical solution needed to be proven in order to allow a procurement exercise to launch the defined project’s implementation.

The objective of the consultancy was to satisfy the SDP requirements, which meant defining the method by which to achieve levels of renewable penetration within a required timeframe.

We began with an analysis of the information and data provided by the St. Helena Government and Connect Saint Helena Ltd as well as further information gathered during fieldwork on the island. The findings of this analysis provided a variety of input for understanding and modeling a simulation of the St. Helena power system. This was followed by discussion of sites on the island whose conditions were favorable for hosting the RE infrastructures needed to achieve the policy goals, scenarios for future power demand, the technical analyses and the findings of the study. Finally, we prepared a recommended implementation roadmap.