CREEC AT ACERA TRAINING IN CONGO

Starting 22^nd to 25^th of October 2019, CREEC participated in a training with a focus on the correlation between Renewable Energy for Economic Development at the Cité des Sciences in Brazzaville, Congo. Participants for the training included students, teacher-researchers and ACERA partners from Uganda, Congo and Tanzania including Angela Nabagesera, Ajambo Flavia and Dr Nabuuma Betty from CREEC-Makerere that represented the Ugandan partners. The various presentations made in English, the working language of the network, were coordinated by Professor Bernard Mpassi Mabiala of the Faculty of Science and Technology of the University Marien Ngouabi, in his capacity as Local Coordinator of the ACERA, and Chair of the organizing committee of the workshop.

The objective of this workshop was to encourage participation in trenewable energy training programs in Africa. Most importantly, students were placed at the centre of finding innovative energy solutions that can boost their economy. The master’s students presented different concepts on innovative ideas for transforming the energy challenges in Sub-saharan coutries using biomass. Dr Betty Nabuuma a researcher affiliated to CREEC and also a supervisor to the Ugandan Phd student on the ACERA program presented on how the students can utilize biomass and transform it in different forms like pellets, briquettes with her main focus being biomass for anaerobic digestion. Her topic of choice was very timely being that many students carrying out biogas projects had experienced challenges with either projects failing or not giving the desired results. She was able to provide expert advice for the students which helped to give new ideas for the students to explore.  

As part of the training, the team also visited a farm in Madibou on the outskirts of the Republic of Congo. The trip was a practical learning experience as Dr Betty Nabuuma demonstrated how the farm can be a productive area with most of the animal residue being used as feedstock for a biogas digester. The team in Congo expressed interest in writing concepts and implementing biogas projects. At the end of the workshop 28 participants were awarded certificates. This brings the number of trained professionals from the ACERA program to 228 since the project’s inception three years ago. In the next two years the project that is coordinated by CREEC will put a special focus on the completion of the student’s interrelated research titled  Solar treatment of biomass for power generation as well as development new innovative research topics.