PARIS, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Oil and gas majors

TotalEnergies, BP, Shell and Equinor ( EQNR )

pledged on Friday to invest $500 million to increase

access to affordable energy, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa,

south and southeast Asia.

The announcement was made on the sidelines of the United

Nations COP29 climate summit in Azerbaijan, where discussion has

focused on raising $1 trillion in climate finance from richer

nations to help developing countries.

A spokesperson for TotalEnergies declined to name the global

private equity firm selected to manage the funds, but said the

$500 million would be disbursed over several years via tenders

for projects along the energy value chain.

That will include domestic solar energy systems,

micro-electricity grids, energy production, transport, logistics

and storage, e-mobility technologies, and modern cooking fuels

such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) primarily in sub-Saharan

Africa, south and southeast Asia.

The International Energy Agency estimates that more than 2.3

billion people worldwide still cook their meals on traditional

stoves burning wood, charcoal and animal dung, leading to health

problems.

"It is early days, but we hope that by jointly investing, we

will be able to contribute to wider efforts to tackle the very

real challenge of access to energy," said BP Chief Executive

Murray Auchincloss.

The firms did not disclose how much each individual company

had pledged.

Earlier this year TotalEnergies announced a separate $400

million investment to develop LPG for cooking in Africa and

India through 2030.