With accelerated economic and population growth rates in recent years, there is no shortage of partners for Africa’s development efforts. This has helped the continent gain prominence in global affairs and become a new frontier in international relations. As one of the continent’s main partners, China has been leading the way in that regard. Recently, Beijing has been involved in what is often referred to as the “green turn”—the embrace of the transition to green energy—with almost 100 “green” energy projects across Africa over the past two decades. In that sense, China has made attempts to make the Belt and Road Initiative more responsive to Africa’s new ecological and energy concerns, with Chinese companies now among the world’s top manufacturers of photovoltaic solar panels and wind turbines. From this “green trend”, several “green” projects have emerged in many African countries.

In this chapter, we analyse two solar power plants with Chinese involvement in Kenya and the Central African Republic. These cases help us get a better picture of how the “green turn” has been co-constructed by the two parties. They also show how African countries are currently experiencing growing dynamics of energy transition in collaboration with Chinese partners.