The 3rd West African Clean Energy and Environment Exhibition and Conference, WACEE took place from 10th to 12th February, 2015 at the Accra International Conference Centre in Accra, Ghana. It was held simultaneously as the German Solar Training Week (GSTW) which was from the 9th to 12th February 2015 at the same venue. As a follow up of previous conferences, this year’s WACEE conference served as a basis of business collaboration and the evaluation of progress in sustainable energy and environment in West Africa.
This year’s conference was themed, “Advancing policy and business collaboration” and the event was organized by the delegation of German Industry and commerce in Ghana (AHK) in collaboration with Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and other partners from Germany. The main focus of the conference was on Environmental protection, waste management and renewable energy development in the private and public sectors in West Africa.
TCC was represented by two of its National Service Personnel, Alhassan Baba Muniruand Dennis Wiafe-Akenteng.
The 4 day program was attended by various dignitaries within the energy sector among which were: H.E. Rudiger John, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to Ghana ,Hon. Akwasi Oppong-Fosu, Minister for Environment, Science, technology and Innovation, Hon Volkman Klein, Member of the German Bundestag, Dr. Isaac Owusu-Mensah, Program Manager of Konrad-Adenaeur-Stiftung, Patrick Martens, Delegate of German Industry and Commerce in Ghana and Dr. Gregor Ryssel, resident representative of Konrad-Adenaeur-Stiftung, Accra.
Day one started with the GSTW and the topic treated was “Introduction to PV and appropriate applications” presented by Frank Robens and Bernd Wolff.
Day two marked the official opening of the 3rd WACEE. There was a West African panel discussion on the topic, “Perspectives of the Environment Industry” where representatives from three West African countries (Ghana, Senegal and Nigeria) presented their country’s perspective on the topic. It emerged that climate based agricultural insurance is a possible solution to help farmers deal with the effect of climate change. In Nigeria, only 1% of the farmers are covered by agric insurance, nearly 100,000 people die in Nigeria from indoor air pollution which is also the 3rd largest killer after malaria and HIV/AIDS. The Nigerian government’s solution was to import a substantial amount of improved clean cooking stoves to help curb this problem.
The program ended with a panel discussion on the topic, “Going green-enhancing resource and energy efficiency in Ghana”. Overall, the program was very informative. Things learnt included the rule of thumb which states that for every 1kw of solar power generated we save 0.3 litres of diesel fuel. A way of planning an off grid solar system could be done using www.sunnydesignweb.com.
It however emerged that most of the projects discussed at the conference were projects already researched into at Technology Consultancy Centre (TCC).
