In the frame of the latest joint project, carried out in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme and the National Ozone Unit of Nigeria, Centro Studi Galileo is supporting the national RAC sector of the African state in building its workforce capacity, specifically increasing the knowledge on energy efficiency and energy saving in all practices concerning refrigeration and air conditioning.
On April 27-29 Centro Studi Galileo delivered the first remote Train-the-Trainers session, held in collaboration with the NOU and UNDP Country Office, to 15 professionals who will later take care of spreading knowledge to other technicians in Nigeria thanks to the newly acquired skills. Thanks to the great engagement, it was possible for CSG Expert Trainer Mr Gianfranco Cattabriga to carry out flawlessly the three-days remote training, focusing on topics such as energy and efficiency, equipment design and its components selection, tools, leak detection, performance monitoring, natural and alternative refrigerants. The training further featured practical demonstrations for the benefit of the 15 participants, inside the laboratory of CoolPlus thanks to the collaboration of Mr Ade Awujoola – Centro Studi Galileo’s national consultant in Nigeria; on the third day, the Trainers could see and try first-hand few RAC best practices such as recovery-vacuum-charge, maintenance and parameters reading.
The purpose of this specific project is to provide capacity building on the integration of energy efficiency into the RAC Servicing Sector in Nigeria under the direct supervision of the UNDP nature Climate and Energy team and the Country Office and in coordination with the global UNDP team working on the K-CEP Programme, and the National Ozone Office of the Federal Ministry of Environment, Nigeria. Under the Montreal Protocol, countries agree to comply with the phase-out ODS consumption by deploying a series of technical assistance and industrial conversion projects, at country level, so producing and consuming sectors can abandon the use of these substances. More than 170 countries agreed to amend the Protocol through what was called the “Kigali Amendment”, that establishes specific targets and timetables to phase-down the production and consumption of HFCs. In addition, countries also agreed to begin examining opportunities to enhance the energy efficiency of the appliances and equipment to achieve additional greenhouse gases’ (GHGs) mitigation, while also delivering additional sustainable development benefits such as better air quality, improved public health, improved energy access and energy security.