Niger Delta Basin Marine/Maritime Spatial Plan

The Niger Delta Development Authorities with 751. Africa

Building Climate Resilience and a Blue Economy in Nigeria's Niger Delta Basin through Integrated Spatial Planning, Ecosystem Restoration and Sustainable Livelihoods is a GCF Simplified Approval Process funding proposal covering Africa's largest wetland system, spanning over 70,000 square kilometres across Rivers, Bayelsa, and Delta States and home to more than 30 million people. The African Development Bank serves as Accredited Entity, with the Niger Delta Basin Development Authority as lead executing entity, supported by AMSSA, 751.Earth, and a consortium of Nigerian universities alongside the University of Plymouth as international academic partner. Technically, the programme responds to acute and worsening climate vulnerability: coastal retreat averages 3.94 metres per year along the 853 km shoreline, 54.5% of mangrove cover has been lost since 1986, and fish stocks face a projected 53% decline by 2050, threatening food security for 6.5 million artisanal fishers. Compounding this, over 9,343 recorded oil spills have poisoned waterways since 1976, at an estimated environmental and economic cost of USD 758 million annually, with local communities bearing roughly 75% of that burden, while Nigeria remains the only major West African coastal nation excluded from the World Bank's WACA Programme. The project delivers one primary output, an authoritative Niger Delta Integrated Spatial Plan, through four components: a climate and environmental evidence base including a Contamination and Biological Sensitivity Atlas; a legally-backed Basin Management Plan and Marine Spatial Plan; an early warning system delivering life-saving flood and pollution alerts to 300,000 people, paired with an NDBDA Waterways Corps pilot of 500 to 750 trained members; and institutional governance strengthening including two university-based Blue Economy and Climate Resilience Centres. Financially, the programme is costed at USD 19.73 million in total investment, with USD 12.2 million requested from GCF as a 100% grant instrument and USD 6.8 million in co-financing from federal and state governments, NDBDA, and university partners, reaching 500,000 direct beneficiaries and an estimated 30 million indirect beneficiaries, roughly 85.7% of the basin's population. As a planning and evidence-generation SAP proposal rather than a mitigation-focused programme, the spatial plan itself is designed as the primary legacy, formally adopted by NDBDA and the Federal Ministry of Water Resources as a statutory planning instrument that will serve as the investment blueprint for a follow-on Full Proposal targeting USD 100 million or more. AfDB retains full fiduciary control with direct payments to all contractors, and 751.Earth provides an independent verification layer, ensuring no funds release without confirmed deliverable completion, a structure specifically designed to manage Nigeria's governance risk environment while embedding lasting spatial-planning capability within Nigerian institutions.

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Ghana:Tema Industrial Decarbonisation Programme

TIDP Focus on Providing Renewable Energy for all Key Ghana Industrial Areas Inclusive of Ports

The Tema Industrial Decarbonisation Programme, TIDP, is a USD 391.5 million GCF concept note submitted through the African Development Bank as Accredited Entity, targeting Ghana's most industrially concentrated geography, the Tema corridor, home to the Tema Oil Refinery, the national petroleum storage network, Ghana's busiest port, and a manufacturing belt spanning the Tema Export Processing Zone and Tema Industrial Area. Ghana's energy sector drives 45.1% of national emissions, and TIDP is designed to deploy waste-heat recovery, solar PV, and West Africa's first Advanced Geothermal System directly into this corridor, displacing costly diesel generation while unlocking Article 6 carbon revenue for the government, with zero treasury exposure. Technically, the programme is built across three components: Component 1 deploys waste-heat recovery modules and rooftop solar across Tema Port and the petroleum hub for roughly 18,000 tCO2e per year abated; Component 2 bundles the same technologies with AI-supported emissions monitoring across the wider industrial zone, scaling to around 140,000 tCO2e per year and roughly 1,800 direct jobs by Phase III; and Component 3 introduces a 12 to 18 MWe Advanced Geothermal System baseload demonstrator, the first verified geothermal installation in West Africa, adding approximately 72,000 tCO2e per year once fully operational. Combined, the programme is estimated to abate 180,000 to 230,000 tCO2e annually once all components are operational, and 8 to 10.5 million tCO2e over its full 20-year lifetime, contributing an estimated 54 to 71% of the energy sector's share of Ghana's NDC mitigation target on its own. Financially, TIDP requests USD 146.5 million in GCF financing, split between a USD 1.5 million Project Preparation Facility grant, USD 90 million for Phases I and II, and USD 55 million conditional for Phase III, expected to mobilise a further USD 245 million in co-financing from AfDB SEFA, IFC, British International Investment, US DFC, and an Independent Programme Sponsor shortlist including AIIM, Africa Finance Corporation, Norfund, and the Ghana Green Fund. This gives the programme a total leverage of approximately 2.7 times the GCF contribution, with a blended abatement cost of roughly USD 7 to 14 per tCO2e, comparing favourably against utility-scale solar (USD 25 to 60), battery storage (USD 80 to 150), and direct air capture (USD 490 to 2,000). Governance runs through a Programme Steering Committee chaired by Ghana's Ministry of Energy and Green Transition, with EPA Ghana holding institutional observer rights, 751.earth and Mizan Energy Gh Ltd managing day-to-day implementation and the full 20-year monitoring, evaluation and verification function, and RRSC licensing the underlying technology without holding equity in any project SPV. A dedicated USD 18.5 million capacity building strand, including university scholarships, EPA Ghana carbon verification training, and TVET technician training with a 40% women's participation target, is built in from the outset to ensure Ghana retains lasting institutional capability rather than remaining dependent on external expertise once the programme concludes.

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African Maritime Safety and Security, ALIEN Program

Implementation of the AU African Maritime Transport Charter (2010) and Eradication of Illegal, Unreported & Unregistered fishing vessels from African Maritime Space

ALIEN, the African Led Interoperable Enforcement Network, is Component 6 of the AMSSA Climate-Resilient Blue Economy and Maritime Governance Platform, a Green Climate Fund Simplified Approval Process concept note led by the African Maritime Safety and Security Agency. Structured as a dedicated anti-illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing enforcement pilot, ALIEN is costed at USD 4.0 million, with USD 3.6 million requested as GCF grant financing and USD 400,000 in in-kind co-financing from judicial and law enforcement partners, making it the fourth-largest of the programme's six components by budget. Technically, ALIEN responds to a stark enforcement gap across West and East Africa's coastal states: under 5% of maritime crimes are currently prosecuted, and IUU fishing, worsened by climate-driven fish migration, costs West Africa an estimated 2.66 million tonnes of unreported catch annually, with comparable gaps documented off Somalia and the Western Indian Ocean. The network is designed to build climate-resilient fisheries enforcement and prosecutorial capacity across the programme's six pilot states, spanning Ghana, Nigeria, and Côte d'Ivoire in the Gulf of Guinea cluster, and Somalia, Djibouti, and Kenya in the East Africa cluster, feeding into the broader Maritime Information System that integrates satellite AIS vessel monitoring with climate early-warning data. Institutionally, ALIEN operates within AMSSA's Accra-headquartered governance structure, with 751.Earth serving as co-Executing Entity responsible for monitoring, evaluation, and safeguards compliance, and formal technical coordination extended to the Indian Ocean Commission's existing Regional Coordination Operations Centre in Seychelles and Regional Maritime Information Fusion Centre in Madagascar to avoid duplicating enforcement infrastructure. This cross-regional interoperability is central to the "network" concept: rather than building siloed national enforcement systems, ALIEN links judicial and law enforcement partners across two coastlines into a single, data-sharing enforcement architecture modelled partly on the European Maritime Safety Agency and the Indian Ocean Commission's own MASE programme. Set within the wider AMSSA platform's USD 22 to 23 million total cost and USD 18 to 19 million GCF funding request, ALIEN contributes to a programme-wide adaptation impact benefiting an estimated 1.9 million direct beneficiaries and a mitigation impact of 480,000 tCO2eq over the project lifespan. As a Component ready for scaling under an ESS Category C or I-3 classification, meaning minimal environmental and social risk since it finances institutional capacity, data systems, and training rather than physical infrastructure, ALIEN is positioned as a low-risk, high-leverage enforcement tool that strengthens Ghana's institutional leadership in regional maritime governance while directly advancing SDG 14, 13, 16, and 8.

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Congo Sacred Forests, Indigenous Conservation Program

Initiating the Congo Basin Strategic Sacred Forest Indigenous Alliance and Conservation Program

The Congo, Sacred Forest: Indigenous Conservation Programme is one of 751.Earth's core initiatives, designed to protect the Congo Basin's forest cover while centring the indigenous peoples and local communities who have stewarded it for generations. It sits within 751.Earth's wider "architecture of impact," which embeds community agency, scientific rigor, and catalytic finance into every initiative, meaning the programme is built from the outset to combine conservation outcomes with tangible livelihood benefits for forest communities, rather than treating protection and development as competing goals. Technically, the programme is anchored in one of the planet's most valuable carbon assets: the Congo Basin absorbs roughly 0.61 gigatonnes of CO2 equivalent net each year, making it the world's most effective single carbon sink, with an annual absorption rate nearly six times that of the Amazon despite covering only about 60% of its area. Collectively, the Basin's forests are estimated to naturally absorb around 4% of global annual emissions, and the value of the carbon removal service the Congo forests alone provide has been estimated at approximately USD 55 billion per year, equivalent to 36% of the combined GDP of the six countries that host the Basin. For indigenous conservation programmes specifically, this scientific backdrop matters commercially as well as environmentally: the six Congo Basin countries have recently launched Strategic Roadmaps for Carbon Market and Climate Finance, developed with World Bank support, designed to help High Forest, Low Deforestation nations align with Paris Agreement Article 6 mechanisms, build MRV-ready institutions, and attract long-term results-based carbon finance. This positions community-led conservation efforts, such as 751.Earth's programme, to potentially access results-based payments and carbon credit revenue as national frameworks mature, provided that land tenure, governance, and monitoring systems meet the rigor these markets demand. As with 751.Earth's other in-development programmes, a project-specific carbon offset figure for the Congo Sacred Forest initiative has not yet been published, since scope, hectare coverage, and implementation partnerships remain subject to confirmation. Once these parameters are finalised, an offset estimate would typically be calculated against the region's established per-hectare sequestration baselines, the same rigorous, science-based methodology already applied by World Bank-backed forest investment projects operating elsewhere in the Basin, such as the Mai-Ndombe emissions reduction programme in the Democratic Republic of Congo

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Lagos Industrial Decarbonisation Program

LIDP a focused carbon reduction of Lagos key Industrial zones

The Lagos Industrial Decarbonisation Programme is a flagship workstream launched under the strategic cooperation between 751.Earth and R. Rockefeller S.C., bringing together Advanced Geothermal Systems (AGS) technology, industrial decarbonisation expertise, and sovereign AI-driven engineering networks with 751.Earth's proven capability in climate finance origination, governance, and multilateral programme development. Anchored in one of Africa's busiest and fastest-growing port cities, the programme was singled out by industry observers as an encouraging example of how structured partnerships can responsibly combine climate finance with industrial transition on the continent. At its technical core, the programme targets the industrial and maritime sectors that underpin Lagos's economy, focusing on port and industrial decarbonisation, waste heat recovery, and the deployment of AGS to deliver clean, reliable energy directly to heavy industry, without requiring a full redesign of existing sites. This approach aligns closely with Nigeria's national CIF Industry Decarbonisation Program, which is seeking to mobilise substantial de-risked investment across low-carbon fuels, energy efficiency, industrial electrification, and carbon capture and utilisation, positioning Lagos as a demonstrable proof point within a much larger national strategy. By channelling technical and financial structuring into Lagos specifically, the programme aims to build a replicable model for decarbonising high-emitting sectors such as cement, steel, oil and gas, and food and beverage processing, sectors that are notoriously difficult to abate through renewable electricity alone. Success in Lagos would offer a template that other African port cities facing similar industrial and maritime emissions pressures could adapt, giving the programme significance well beyond its immediate geography. The programme remains in preparation and institutional structuring, with each element proceeding only after technical validation, alignment with relevant public authorities, and execution of a dedicated project protocol, reflecting 751.Earth's broader philosophy of translating national climate priorities into credible, investable project pipelines rather than rushing to premature deployment. This measured approach is intended to give investors, government partners, and Lagos's own industrial base confidence that the transition, once underway, will be technically sound, properly governed, and built to last Nigeria's Third Nationally Determined Contribution commits the country to an absolute emissions reduction of 168 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent by 2030 and 185 million tonnes by 2035, relative to 2018 levels, a 29% and 32% cut respectively. Within that plan, the oil and gas sector alone targets a 60% cut in fugitive emissions, representing a mitigation potential of about 27.3 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent, illustrating the kind of industrial abatement pool that port and heavy-industry decarbonisation efforts in Lagos could tap into

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Zambia, Food Security Centres of Excellence

AFSCoE Zambia, spearheading the Zambia Agricultural Renaissance for future generations and the world

The African Food Security Centre of Excellence, AFSCoE–Zambia, is two 1,000 hectare university-anchored campus and working farm designed to advance climate-smart agriculture through a combined programme of training, applied research, agripreneurship, value-chain development, and precision farming. By anchoring the centre to a university partnership, the project ensures that every innovation tested on the ground is also grounded in rigorous applied research, creating a continuous feedback loop between classroom learning, field practice, and market-ready agricultural solutions. At the heart of the programme the two 1,000 hectares of land will establish a practical training and innovation hub,s giving students and local farmers a real working environment in which to apply climate-smart techniques rather than learning them only in theory. Precision farming tools, including soil and microclimate sensors, will be deployed across the hub,s allowing participants to make data-driven decisions about irrigation, planting, diversification and resources, along with accelerated agro-preneurship learning for use in a country where climate variability increasingly threatens smallholder yields. Over a five-year horizon, the centre aims to equip up to 5,000 youth with sustainable agricultural and entrepreneurship skills, directly addressing two of Zambia's most pressing development challenges at once: youth unemployment and food insecurity. This dual focus reflects a broader recognition across Zambian and regional agricultural policy that climate resilience and economic opportunity must be built together, not treated as separate goals, particularly as national climate-smart agriculture strategies increasingly seek to combine productivity gains with genuine livelihood impact. Currently nearly finalised, AFSCoE–Zambia is positioned to become a replicable model for the wider region, demonstrating how a single, well-resourced hub can simultaneously train a future agricultural workforce, generate applied research relevant to local conditions, and support the broader goal of rural economic growth and self-reliance. As Zambia and neighbouring countries face increasing pressure to adapt their agricultural sectors to a changing climate, this kind of integrated, university-anchored approach offers a credible pathway from research to real-world resilience.

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