Nigeria: Renewable energy to improve connectivity in 500 rural communities
September 17th 2026
Nigeria is Africa’s largest telecoms market with 195.1 million mobile subscribers and 157.7 million internet subscribers. Yet, a portion of the population is still deprived of telecoms services.
Nigerian connectivity and telecom infrastructure provider Hotspot Network Limited has been selected to deploy telecommunications and broadband infrastructure in 500 underserved communities across the country. This initiative is part of ongoing efforts to bridge the digital divide in Nigeria.
The project is being implemented as part of the Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-Up (DARES) program, funded by the World Bank in partnership with the Rural Electrification Agency (REA). Hotspot’s selection was revealed on Tuesday, September 15, 2026, by the local media outlet The PUNCH , which claims to have obtained the project documents exclusively.
Hotspot will deploy mobile voice and data services (2G and 4G), broadband Internet services, community Wi-Fi networks and digital infrastructure powered by renewable energy in selected communities.
“ By combining resilient telecommunications infrastructure with renewable energy solutions, we are creating new opportunities in education, health, financial inclusion, entrepreneurship and sustainable economic growth in rural areas ,” said Okezie Ofoegbu, chairman of the board of Hotspot Network Limited, as reported by The PUNCH.
A broader strategy for extending coverage
This initiative comes as Nigerian authorities are ramping up projects to extend telecom coverage to underserved populations. The Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Bosun Tijani, announced this week the activation of at least 200 new telecom sites before December, as part of efforts to improve access to telecommunications services for more than 20 million Nigerians.
These new infrastructures are part of a larger project that plans to deploy 3,700 telecom towers across the country. According to the minister, each tower should serve communities of between 5,000 and 10,000 inhabitants.
The government also plans to develop a 90,000 km fiber optic network to expand broadband infrastructure and improve internet access nationwide. For areas difficult to reach via fiber or terrestrial infrastructure, the authorities also intend to utilize satellite capabilities.
Since the least connected populations largely live in rural areas, using renewable energy to power telecom infrastructure addresses one of the obstacles to network deployment in these regions: limited access to electricity. In Nigeria, the rural electricity access rate was only 26% in 2023, compared to 84% in urban areas, according to the World Bank.
Furthermore, the DARES program aims to provide new or improved access to electricity to more than 17.5 million Nigerians through decentralized renewable solutions.
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