Green Powered Technology (GPTech) is dedicated to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which aims to create a healthy environment, good living conditions and access to opportunities for all. With renewable energy at our core, GPTech strives to improve infrastructure and development of communities around the world. GPTech strives to create a future where sustainable sources of energy are accessible to all and where people value the social, economic, and environmental benefits that green energy provides. In 2019, GPTech became a Signatory of the United Nations Global Compact, joining a global network of over 9,500 companies and 3,000 non-business participants that are committed to building a sustainable future.

GPTech’s projects have contributed to the global effort to achieve Goal 6 – Clean Water and Sanitation; Goal 7 – Affordable and Clean Energy; Goal 9 – Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure; Goal 11 – Sustainable Cities and Communities; and Goal 13 – Climate Action. In every project GPTech takes and in our actions, we look to embrace these SDGs. Availability and type of energy used affects climate change, a country’s security, job access, food production and much more.

GPTech strives to limit the gap between communities with and without affordable, reliable or sustainable energy. In order to do this, we push for clean alternatives, such as renewable energy sources, and try to make energy accessible for everyone. We work in the developing and developed world, to make sure that energy is not a limiting factor. In creating a world where sustainable energy is accessible to all, working in the nexus of energy, infrastructure, and development is key to our mission.

The USAID Energy Opportunities for Agriculture Systems and Food Security Project (E4AS Project), completed in 2018, exemplifies GPTech’s dedication to affordable and clean energy for all. There are slightly less than 1 billion people in the world without electricity and 50% of those people live in Sub-Saharan Africa. GPTech partnered with ACDI/VOCA to discover how clean energy and energy efficiency can strengthen post-harvest agricultural value chains and reduce agricultural loss in selected Sub-Saharan African countries, while also practicing low emission development strategies.

There is a great need for reliable distribution, storage and processing facilities in Sub-Saharan Africa, which creates new energy markets within agricultural value chains and food systems. Three main questions were examined when studying the system:

1. What are the key opportunities to increase energy efficiency (EE) and renewable energy (RE) within the agricultural value chains that bridge rural production and urban food demand or export markets?
2. How can these opportunities be integrated into policy, partnerships, and planning?
3. What role can these opportunities for low-carbon energy use in post-harvest agriculture systems play in achieving a country’s low emission development goals?

GPTech and ACDI/VOCA reported on integration of clean energy in Sub-Saharan Africa using literature review, field work and case studies in Kenya and Senegal’s dairy sectors. Main findings from the Kenya and Senegal dairy sector studies can be found below:

The results and recommendations from this study promote an increase in renewable energy use for post-harvest agricultural facilities in Sub-Saharan Africa. One 10,000L/day capacity dairy in Kenya already adopted a 100kW solar PV array as its primary electricity source and saved 75% in monthly electric bills from Kenya Power. With a savings of $3,000 per month, this system has a payback period of less than three years.

Recommendations from GPTech included small scale solar chillers, solar mini-grids and energy efficiency audits, all of which would increase access and reliability of renewable energy for post-harvest facilities with limited access currently. GPTech found that renewable energy was not only the right choice to decrease emissions that contribute to climate change from post-harvest processes, but renewable energy also helps facilities become more independent, produce milk more reliably and save money.

For more information on this project, read Clean Energy for Productive Use in Post-Harvest Value Chains: An Integrated Literature Review with Field Work for the Kenya and Senegal Dairy Sectors posted on AgriLinks and Energy Opportunities for Agriculture Systems and Food Security posted on ClimateLinks.