Zayed Sustainability Prize finalists aim for positive change
A social enterprise on a mission to promote sustainable development in every African rural community through renewable energy, another firm aiming to extend the hours of power availability where resource is limited in refugee camps, and a third company providing solar solutions for remote locations in Africa and Asia – these are the three finalists of the Zayed Sustainability Prize 2023 in the energy category.
Sharing their inspiring stories with Khaleej Times, they claim that winning the Prize, which will be declared later this month, would help them impact the lives of millions.
Operating with sustainability and female empowerment at its core, Cameroon-based Monique Ntumngia founded Green Girls Organisation (GGO) in 2015 after seeing how a shortage of electricity led to a lack of education. Her social enterprise uses artificial intelligence and geospatial technology to identify the specific clean energy problems that affect African rural communities.
Through GGO, she teaches women and girls how to generate solar energy as well as biogas from waste to use as a cleaner and affordable source of cooking fuel.
GGO uses an innovative algorithm, the MNKB92 model, to map the energy needs of different rural communities and select the most appropriate solution based on the collected data — either cleaner cooking fuel in the form of biogas or solar power for their homes.
Ntumngia noted that winning the Prize would enable GGO to impact 20 African countries, improving the lives of at least a million women and girls across 100 additional African rural communities for the next 36 months.
Neurotech, a Jordanian energy management company launched in 2018, has helped ensure fairer distribution of energy in refugee camps and reduced energy bills for aid agencies. This was achieved by separating high priority loads — such as medical devices and lighting — from low priority loads, which include airconditioning and electric heaters.
"By separating the loads, beneficiaries are guaranteed to receive lifesaving energy first, with the energy going to low priority feeders based on availability,” Heba Asad, cofounder and CEO, Neurotech, said.
Neurotech delivered electricity to more than 1,000 Syrian refugees in the Azraq Refugee Camp in Jordan as part of its pilot scheme, reducing pressure on the camp hospital’s respiratory ward, which used to receive an influx of patients when power was only available at certain times of the day. Now patients can now be treated at any time.
Asad, a 31-year-old entrepreneur, said winning the Prize would enable her company to help even more people by funding the development of an interactive application encouraging both refugees and local communities to be more energy efficient.
Germany-based Solarkiosk Solutions — founded in 2011 by Andreas Spiess and GRAFT architects— designs, manufactures and operates solar solutions for remote locations in Africa and Asia that do not have access to electricity. Its E-hubb solarpowered kiosks are now being used in shops, schools, hospitals, sports centres, cafés and offices.
CEO Thomas Rieger believes the technology has the potential to transform underserved rural offgrid communities, and to win over its sceptics.
“It has been challenging to convince donors and investors that it is possible to build such projects and achieve self-sustainable growth in the long run. So, we took it upon ourselves to implement and operate hundreds of projects. We kickstarted economies in rural off-grid communities, breaking the poverty trap in neglected, underserved and underdeveloped areas.”
The company has designed and implemented around 300 rural projects in 15 countries in Africa and southeast Asia, including refugee camps in Bangladesh, Jordan and Ethiopia. It has positively impacted the lives of millions of people and created thousands of jobs, mostly for women.