What will be covered?
- Energy regulation and power sector reform.
- Increased renewable energy technology penetration for rural electrification.
- Sustainable use of energy through energy efficiency in industrial, commercial and domestic sectors (including energy efficiency within buildings).
n 2004, REEEP commissioned the development of an initial training package enti-tled “Regulation and Sustainable Energy”. This was produced by the Centre for Management under Regulation (CMUR) at Warwick University, United Kingdom, and provides an introduction to key issues in energy market and monopoly reg-ulation as they affect sustainable energy, mainly electricity supply and consump-tion. This training package focused on the situation in developed countries, with case studies from Europe, the United States and Australia and was completed in April 2005. An outline of this training package is available from the REEEP website at www.reeep.org/groups/sern REEEP then requested UNIDO to adapt and expand the training package to a developing country context, in the light of present experiences in, as well as constraints of, energy policy and regulation in developing countries. In November 2005, UNIDO commissioned IT Power, AFREPREN, ESD and a host of national African experts to assist UNIDO to adapt and expand the existing train-ing package, develop new material and publish a new training package on Sustainable Energy Regulation and Policymaking for Africa. The new training package focuses on regulation, policy and sustainable energy for African coun-tries and includes case studies, and examples from a number of countries across sub-Saharan Africa.
Aim of the Training
The aim of the training package is to achieve a positive input in these three areas by increasing the awareness and knowledge of energy regulatory and policymak-ing bodies and their personnel, and thereby strengthen energy sector regulating and policymaking capacity within African governments.
The training package will:
• Provide a better understanding and awareness of the benefits of renewable energy and energy efficient technologies and an improved knowledge of proven policy and regulating models, mechanisms and practices available to support the development and deployment of sustainable energy technologies, through case studies from Europe, Africa and worldwide.
• Show how the pursuing of the key objective of sustainable energy develop-ment through renewable energy and energy efficient technologies can be pro-moted and supported by national energy regulations, policies and standards.
The training package has been designed to be used as a modular training resource in order to allow the user to select individual module topics without being forced to read all the proceeding modules. Therefore, a certain amount of repetition exists in the material presented between some of the different modules.
The information presented in each of the modules varies in terms of technical detail with some aspects being significantly technical in nature. Although the training manual is primarily directed towards energy sector policymaking and reg-ulatory institutions, it is a prerequisite for these institutions to have an appreci-ation of the technical implications, mechanisms, tools and measures that will form the basis of appropriate and sustainable policies and regulations.
Further to this, policymakers and regulators should have an understanding of how the industrial, commercial and residential sectors will operate within, and conform to, any new or additional policies that aim to promote sustainable energy options. For this to be possible, these institutions need to have an intimate under-standing of the different aspects of the energy sector and how they function. The training package, through its use of differing industrial, policy and regulatory per-spectives as well as technical information, aims to provide this necessary level and diversity of information.
Suggested target audience
This training package is relevant to the needs of developing country governments, policymaking bodies and regulating institutions responsible for the development and functioning of the national energy sector and their staff. The training package should be particularly useful for staff in regulatory agencies and government departments who are new to regulation or to the ways that regulation can affect sustainable energy.
The main beneficiaries of the training package will be the policymakers and reg-ulators of the energy sector in African countries, however many of the modules contain generic information on sustainable energy which can be useful to energy policymakers and regulators in all developing countries.
Although policymakers and regulators are the principal target audience for the training package, it will also be useful to others who need to understand sus-tainable energy regulation, particularly energy companies. It therefore has the potential to benefit a wide variety of governmental and non-governmental organ-izations in the energy sector, including private companies, utilities, universities, research institutes, developmental agencies, NGOs and others, which are involved in policymaking, policy analysis, regulation and standard development.
As interested parties take up this “Sustainable Energy Regulation and Policymaking for Africa” training package, it can be developed further or used for a variety of training purposes at regional and national level in Africa and other developing countries.
STRUCTURE OF THE TRAINING PACKAGE
The training package provides an introduction to the key issues relating to the energy market and energy regulation, as they affect sustainable energy (energy efficiency, cogeneration and renewable energy). The training package focuses mainly on the policies and regulation relating to the generation, transmission, distribution and consumption of electricity and the opportunities and barriers in developing renewable energy and energy efficiency in these sectors. It is stressed that the training package is intended as an introduction to the subject and each module contains references to sources of more in-depth information.
There is no “perfect” generic way of designing or implementing regulation or poli-cies for sustainable energy development. Each energy national sector differs—for example, in patterns of ownership, the degree of integration of energy companies, the level of competition and the maturity of a particular energy sys-tem. This training package does not set out to prescribe or recommend models of regulation or policies, which should necessarily be copied, but instead aims to provide examples of where regulation and/or policies have proved effective (or harmful) for the development of sustainable energy technologies.
The modules of the training package are therefore designed to
• Provide an introduction to energy regulation, focusing on the electricity market, and how it relates to power sector reform;
• Provide an introduction to renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies and programmes;
• Outline issues affecting the implementation of sustainable energy technologies;
• Highlight useful examples of “good practice” and explain why they are effective;
• Provide an indication of more detailed studies elsewhere;
• Provoke discussion amongst participants.