- The EU will provide €8m for solar off-grid refrigeration in Africa.
- The new project called SophiA will deploy containerised solutions to be piloted in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Malawi and Uganda.
The European Union is set to fund a new project to develop off-grid cooling systems for hospitals and pharmacies in Africa. The SophiA (Sustainable Off-grid solutions for Pharmacies and Hospitals In Africa) project plans to deploy containerised solar systems to provide clean energy to remote solutions.
The project, with a budget of €8 million, will be funded via the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program. The project will involve thirteen partners from Europe and Africa. The SophiA project will use technologies like PV, solar thermal power, electrical and thermal storage and “sophisticated” water treatment to develop and manufacture “locally innovative, modular, affordable and efficient” systems. The system will be piloted in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Malawi and Uganda.
According to the International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR), one of the partners on the project, “the multinational and multidisciplinary SophiA team will use a holistic approach for developing tailored solutions to provide green energy and clean water to hospitals in Africa, without the need to re-design the existing infrastructures,”