A Port Harcourt-based environment action group has received endorsement of the World Bank as one of three that executed community solar projects well.
The endorsement is said to have opened the door for another nine projects in the Niger Delta.
The Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC) led by Fyneface Dumnamene Fyneface, Executive Director, YEAC-Nigeria, is said to have been listed among the first three organizations in Nigeria’s solar mini-grid sector to complete the full World Bank Performance-Based Grant (PBG).
This is under the Nigeria Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-up (DARES), via its contractor, NXT GRID Nigeria and Netherlands.
Details of this development were publicly shared by NXT GRID Netherlands and Nigeria on Friday, May 15, 2026, and are contained in a 3-page statement dated May 8, 2026.
Fyneface, who also serves as the Director of the Solar Mini-Grid and Renewable Energy-focused YEAC Community Energy and Development (YEAC-CEAD), commended the UK office of the organisation, the Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-UK), its Country Director Helena Farstad, and the board members for supporting and funding YEAC’s work on the solar mini-grid in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region.
Fyneface also thanked the team in Nigeria and all other individuals and organisations that have supported, funded and encouraged him and the organisation, one way or the other, leading to these achievements and milestones, adding that more collaborations, support and funding are needed for YEAC to do more for the people and society at large.
He further noted that the support helped turn an idea he conceived on November 25, 2019 under hostage—to power communities without electricity (CWE) in the Niger Delta.
He said this was part of measures to contribute to the fight against pipeline vandalism, crude oil theft, artisanal refineries, environmental pollution and youth unemployment through alternative livelihood opportunities powered by clean energy—into reality, with expansion to at least nine more communities now underway beyond Umuolu, Ndokwa East LGA, Delta State.
In August 12, 2024, when the facility in Ndokwa East was commissioned, Fyneface had said the primary purpose of the facility was to support the government’s and other organisations’ efforts to mitigate pipeline vandalism, crude oil theft, artisanal refineries, and associated environmental pollution in the Niger Delta by offering alternative livelihood opportunities powered by renewable energy and thereby reinforcing positive behaviour for environmental protection and sustainability.
He had said: “The idea of contributing to Nigeria’s oil theft mitigation mechanism through community energy for households and its productive use also posited that with households powered, people would no longer use illegally refined petroleum products, particularly DPK and PMS, to energise their homes.
“This would shrink the market for illegal refiners and reduce incidents of pipeline vandalism, crude oil theft, artisanal refineries, and environmental pollution, as their supply chain and demand would drastically drop in communities with clean, renewable, and sustainable solar electricity.”
It is not the stage of the new nine facilities and their locations in the Niger Delta.
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