Africa is a crucial player to tackle the world energy challenge since major global energy, climate and sustainable goals depend on the future of this region. Energy demand in Africa will increase by 50% from 2012 to 2040 according to the International Energy Agency. Altough African greenhouse gases will share around 5% of global emissions at 2040, major climate change impacts will hit this vulnerable region with extreme wheater events and socio-economic disruptions. Finally, the achievement of 2030 Sustainable Development goals will depend on how the access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy will be provided in Africa. Beyond these challenges, energy can be a game changer to promote sustainable development in Africa. Northern Africa has a key role because of its overlooking position on Europe, its historical tradition in the energy field and the huge potential in renewable sources. Libya has the largest proven oil reserves in Africa as well as a huge potential for renewable energy, however, the country still depends on fossil fuels. The current conflict and its reflection on the energy scene have made urget a transition of the national energy system. The overall objective of this proposal is to develop an innovative educational platform based on new courses and digital tools able to capture the disrupting changes of the future energy transition based on the growing use of renewable energy and access to modern energy services.A Master in Renewable and Sustainable Energy will be conceived basing on a multi-level approach to capacity building. In addition, the project aims to engage citizens in sustainability via the creation of a MOOC for citizens.In the long-term, this project will affect three target groups including 1) government, with an increase of economic development and job creation, 2) organization, with a multi-stakeholder commitment from the public to the private sector, and 3) individuals, with an increase of skills and engagement.
The project “Building capacity in renewable and sustainable energy for Libya – Enbrain” (586221-EPP-1-2017-1-IT-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP) had, as the overall objective, the development of a knowledge framework that could support the Libya in its energy transition towards modern and renewable energy resources. As a major result, a master in Renewable and Sustainable Energy has been then designed and approved in five Libyan universities, namely University of Tripoli, Zawia University, Misurata University, Sebha University and Sirte University. The master will contribute to provide the required knowledge to the Country that has been left behind in recent years with respect to the great wave of investments in new energies that experienced neighborhood North African countries.The new master has been developed by providing background, cross-sectorial knowledge and vertical skills in the field of selected renewable energy technologies following a T-shape educational approach. In particular, the master has been designed around four main focal areas that are crucial knowledge for young and future graduates that aim to contribute to a transition towards renewable and sustainable energy: 1) technical/scientific area; 2) social area; 3) economic area; 4) political and environmental area.The project has first started with some activities aiming at engaging the Libyan university staff and stakeholder into the curriculum development by organizing a Strategy Workshop Forum at the University of Tripoli and a round table in Torino during the kick-off meeting of the project involving Italian energy companies. Furthermore, desktop research has been carried out in order to identify best practices at European level in the field of curricula in energy engineering. The master in Renewable and Sustainable Energy includes the detailed syllabus for 15 new courses that have been discussed during a training held in Tunis and involving 54 staff from Libyan Universities. These courses are supported by labs that have been designed to improve the learning process of students and by video-lectures (Moocs), useful to start some preliminary experience with flipped learning and disseminate sustainable approaches across the country opening to civil society.The project achieved its main goal with success in spite of all the difficulties faced along its lifetime. Additionally, the experience gained throughout the project and the methodologies developed within it makes the Enbrain project an important reference for future collaboration-type projects with other countries, which constitutes an important achievement as well.This result is firstly an achievement of Libyan partners that have worked facing multiple and puzzling challenges to finalize the assigned tasks with a high sense of duty. This result is an achievement of the European Commission that has bet on starting development projects in Libya when the situation was still of emergency for the Country and has given the Consortium almost 2 years of project extension in order to finalize all pending and difficult activities. This result is finally an achievement of the whole Consortium and the European partners that have worked in a difficult situation for almost five years learning to find solutions for a Country battered by a civil war, under a financial embargo, with a lack of diplomatic corps (except the Italian Embassy whose help has been precious), the rarefied presence of international air carriers and the final pandemic situation that has caused the closure of Libyan universities for almost 1 year with an incalculable loss of opportunities for young Libyans.