…Urges stakeholders to avoid non-energy friendly equipment
By Merit Ibe
The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) yesterday commissioned a Bioclimatic Testing Chamber for Air Conditioners with support of the European Union and BMZ within the framework of the Nigerian Energy Support Programme (NESP).
NESP is a technical assistance Programme co-funded by the EU and the BMZ and implemented by the Deutsche Geselischaft fur internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Power.
In his remarks, Director General of SON, Mallam Farouk Salim expressed the organisation’s appreciation to NESP on its efforts in the development of the renewable energy and energy efficiency sector and assured of SON’s commitment to maintain and utilise the facility for compliance testing.
“SON plans to also expand its efforts through the procurement of equipment for testing the quality and efficiency of other renewable energy and energy efficient appliances.
“As a country, we are still struggling with energy shortage and whatever we can to ensure that we have an energy efficiency system should be done. “That is why the SON, with NESP and GIZ are ensuring that this comes to reality.
“The stakeholders should check what they use in the homes. I will encourage you to use energy friendly-tools in your homes and avoid non-energy friendly equipment.”
While commissioning the chamber, the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Power, Mr. Temitope Fashedemi congratulated SON for the giant stride and encouraged the organisation to intensify the monitoring and enforcement of the standards, especially due to the rising magnitude of pollution caused by the influx of substandard cooling devices.
Energy Programme Manager at the EU Delegation to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Mr Godfrey Ogbemudia, noted: “This initiative is set to accelerate improvements in the quality and efficiency of ACs in the Nigerian market; ultimately encouraging private sector investments in the RE/EE sector as a whole.”
Also speaking at the event, Duke Benjamin, Head of Programme, NESP said: “The programme will provide SON staff with capacity building support to conduct regular market surveillance to ensure compliance of manufacturers and importers of RE/EE products to quality and efficiency specifications.”
Once the facility is fully operational, the improvement in the quality and efficiency of both domestically manufactured and imported ACs in the Nigerian market would be undeniable.