Africa will be one of the fastest growing areas in the world in the next century both in terms of population and economy. The continent has enormous resources and will seek to develop these along sustainable lines. Geoscience will be very important in this sustainable development, and geodata will be vital. This blog discusses the role that the Deep-time Digital Earth (DDE) program of the International Union of Geological Sciences will have in providing data and research platforms to understand geological resources better. 

Africa and the energy transition

Just looking at the map of energy use per capita across the world, it is clear that Africa has a lot of growing to do (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Energy use per person, 2021. Africa is set to grow in the next few decades. From ‘Our World in Data’

Africa has enormous natural advantages for the energy transition and for developing modern low carbon industrial systems:

1.             New gas discoveries across the continent to power low carbon power and industry, and a hydrogen economy

2.             Onshore and offshore basins for gas storage, low temperature geothermal, and carbon capture and storage

3.             Key minerals for battery and other low carbon technologies: e.g. cobalt, tantalum and fluorspar

These natural advantages can transform resource wealth into sustainable economic development that benefits all Africans, while also conserving and enhancing the natural environment in line with the sustainable development goals. As demand rises for energy and critical raw materials, African nations are aiming at inward investment to develop local industry from mining to manufacturing to high value service industries, but also to get the best out of the resources that they choose to export.

The flow of accessible geodata is key to local and inward foreign investment. The International Union of Geological Sciences founded in 1961, with 121 national members, is one of the World’s largest scientific organizations. Through its first big science program – Deep-time Digital Earth – it aims to work with African partners to develop better accessibility to key African geodata and develop artificial intelligence techniques to get more out of data.

Getting data ready

Geological materials are the source of hydrocarbons, minerals and geological storage space to enable economic growth such as low carbon gas for power and industry, critical raw materials, renewables-enabling storage technologies like hydrogen storage, direct renewables such as aquifer geothermal, and carbon capture and storage which can abate emissions from power and industry. Thus geoscience is at the heart of modern low carbon industrial systems (Stephenson 2018). The Global South is set to grow fastest in the next two or three decades but there is a challenge in providing the geological capacity and data to ensure ownership and participation in technologies that are rapidly becoming dominated by the Global North (Stephenson 2021). High quality data needs to be made available to developing country geoscientists, and developing country institutions including geological surveys, universities and government regulatory and planning departments, so that they can strategically develop their geological assets.

DDE is developing two projects. The first looks at sedimentary basins as a key resource across Africa. In the past they have been the source of hydrocarbons and minerals and other resources, but now are the focus of carbon abatement technologies such as carbon capture and storage, renewables-enabling storage technologies like hydrogen storage, and direct renewables such as aquifer geothermal. The second looks at African critical raw materials to transform natural resource wealth into economic development through understanding of the size and distribution of these resources, and access to geodata and its interpretation for African and international investors.

Africa basins project

Decarbonisation will partly be enabled through geological techniques such as carbon capture and storage (Fig. 1), aquifer geothermal and hydrogen storage in geological sedimentary basins (Stephenson 2021). Such basins are generally underexplored in the Global South leaving developing countries, their universities, students, institutions and governments unable to develop these key technologies, and being forced to rely on developed world expertise and investment. These basins need exploring at a broad scale to understand their potential and to guide strategic planning and investment. DDE proposes the development of screening tools deriving from its sophisticated data and models that will be made available freely and inclusively to African universities, students, institutions and governments to build their geological capacity and plan for national strategies for sustainable resource use.

Fig. 2. Carbon capture and storage connected to power stations and industry may be important in Africa in the future

Africa critical raw materials project

The projected demand for critical raw materials is huge: an increase by a factor of four for graphite, five for cobalt, and eighteen for lithium by 2030; and by a factor of thirteen for graphite, fourteen for cobalt, and nearly sixty for lithium by 2050 (Stephenson et al. 2023). Africa has large resources of these and other materials for the energy transition. The opportunity for African nations to transform their natural resource wealth into economic development can be enhanced if there is an understanding of the size and distribution of these resources, and access to geodata and its interpretation for African and international investors. Previous studies (e.g. Christmann 2021) have shown that Africa’s economic development through the extractive industries sector is inhibited by the lack of, and difficulties of access to geodata. These problems act as disincentives to investment, planning and social interaction, and raise the cost barriers for both the public and private sectors intending to develop the EI sector.

DDE’s broad aim is to harmonise, connect and develop accessibility to data ‘islands’ to support broad-based scientific studies relevant to the entire Earth system (Stephenson et al. 2021), but also to develop geodata for economic development as part of the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDGs). DDE is researching interoperability, protocols, and platforms to deliver vast amounts of existing (and new) geodata, and researching ways to make geodata accessible to artificial intelligence.

DDE proposes a project to link and make accessible online geodata for critical raw materials for groups of African countries. The DDE standards program will work to improve interoperability between data systems to allow seamless delivery across borders and to enable artificial intelligence techniques accessible to African scientists to get the best out of their geodata. The project will build on and interact with previous and current projects such as the African Mineral Geo-science Initiative (AMGI) and bilateral agreements such as the EU-Namibia raw materials partnership. The project will involve establishment of a DDE centre of excellence in Africa that will use DDE expertise in computing and be a centre for training and capacity building for African geoscientists.

Watch this space

DDE is working with partners to develop approaches to these two projects. DDE scientists are organizing a  one day workshop at the Colloquium of African Geology in September 2023 in Namibia (http://gsafr.org/29th-colloquium-of-african-geology-september-26th-to-29th-2023/). The workshop will be a forum for African researchers in geodata, and members of DDE explaining the Africa projects and demonstrating the exciting DDE Platform. Please contact Prof Mike Stephenson if you’re interested in attending the workshop.

You can have a sneak preview of the platform during Mike Stephenson’s recent talk to the Geological Society of Africa on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTEbnvwyHf4&t=1942s)

References

Christmann, P. 2021. Mineral Resource Governance in the 21st Century and a sustainable European Union. Miner Econ, 34, 187–208

Stephenson M.H. 2021 Affordable and Clean Energy. In: Gill J.C., Smith M. (eds) Geosciences and the Sustainable Development Goals. Sustainable Development Goals Series. Springer, pp 159–182.

Stephenson, Michael H,  John Ludden, Jennifer McKinley, Ishwaran Natarjan, Susan Nash, David Leary, Yichuan Shi, Chengshan Wang 2023. The need for joined-up thinking in critical raw materials research. Geoenergy 2023; doi: https://doi.org/10.1144/geoenergy2023-001

Stephenson M.H. 2018. Energy and Climate Change: An Introduction to Geological Controls, Interventions and Mitigations Elsevier, April 2018. eBook ISBN: 9780128120224; Paperback ISBN: 9780128120217,