Rural households represent, by far, the greater percentage of dwellings globally without access to the electricity supply. For reasons of low loads, distance from the grid and speed of deployment, distributed energy systems are now considered viable options for rural electrification. This paper presents the status of solar Photovoltaic (PV) in Nigeria and discusses the way forward for aggressive PV penetration in Nigeria's energy mix, especially in rural communities. At present, distributed PV penetration in Nigeria is comparatively low based on the International Energy Association's recommended PV market potential. This shows that there is a gap between the government's policy targets and reality. The solar resource potential across the six geo-political zones in Nigeria is also presented, which ranges from 3.393 -6.669 kWh/ m 2 /day, with the Northern zones exhibiting better potentials over the Southern zones. It is shown that the levelised cost of electricity from PV system ranges from 0.387 -0.475 $/kWh, whereas it is 0.947 US$/kWh and 0.559 US$/kWh for the diesel generator and glass-covered kerosene lamp, respectively. While this study shows that PV for rural household lighting is more affordable as compared to glass-covered kerosene lamps and fossil-fuelled generators for lighting, fiscal and energy policies for market creation are critical if PV systems are to deliver on their promise for rural electrification and climate change mitigation.

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Global concerns over increasing carbon emissions, climate change, decreasing environmental quality, limited and uneven endowments of fossil fuels, rising energy demand, and volatile oil prices have inspired the move toward global energy system decarbonization. The challenges of achieving ambitious climate targets and sustainable development cannot be solved without the significant efforts of the Global South. Regarding net-zero emissions, the main issue for developing countries is avoiding future emissions from industrialization and lock-in into fossil fuel-intensive technologies. However, achieving strategic and ambitious climate targets in the Global South will require understanding the economic implications of decarbonization. This study’s objective and key contribution are to systematically review and provide a detailed assessment of the literature on decarbonization in the Global South to understand the multi-level economic implications of achieving net-zero emissions in the Global South. The assessment considers four broad themes–investment costs, employment impacts, economic growth, and other macroeconomic impacts (such as consumption, debt level, net savings, income and welfare, and trade balance, among others). Overall, the review finds that energy system decarbonization requires substantial investment outlay. Also, it is linked with job displacement in fossil energy sectors and job creation in green sectors. However, there is no unanimous evidence on net job creation in developing countries. Additionally, the GDP impacts are ambiguous; some studies find future GDP growth impacts, while others find GDP decline impacts of decarbonization scenarios. This paper also provides directions for future research.