Bamidele Adebisi is a Nigerian professor at the Manchester Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom (UK). Adebisi, a chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy is an advocate of clean and affordable energy supply in Nigeria which is the idea behind his involvement in Nigeria Intelligent Clean Energy (NICE) market place project. In this interview with Ngozi Okpalakunne, he talked about the project, the contributions of Nigerians in the Diaspora towards the nation’s development and other issues of national interest. Excerpts:
What is the NICE project all about?
Nigeria Intelligent Clean Energy marketplace project is one of the market-focused energy projects funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) to address the need for clean, affordable and secure energy in Sub-Saharan Africa. It started in November 2019.
My university, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK is working in partnership with VAYA Energy and Qbot Energy, companies based in Abuja and Manchester, respectively on this project. NICE will build an innovative technical architecture to enable a localised energy service offering and a peer-to-peer (P2P) platform for local energy trading and sharing. It is envisaged that this will meet the needs of local communities in Nigeria where this initiative is being trailed. The platform will be designed to support community or private energy Service Company, along with a negotiated agreement with the electricity network operator in the region. This model would allow for the optimised use of locally generated power while also working with the electricity grid.
This P2P energy concept draws inspiration from and builds on other P2Ps such as Uber, Airbnb, among others. The idea is to enable trading and sharing of energy, improving access to low cost renewable energy while ensuring security of supply. While it connects a variety of distributed energy resources such as solar and biogas, it will also manage flexibility through battery storage and controlling loads from sites integrated into the platform, allowing people within a community to trade or share energy with their neighbours. This concept employs new technologies such as artificial intelligence, virtual mini-grid, smart metering, Internet of Things (IoTs), local energy market place, demand side management and a host of others.
Nigeria is a very community-based society, which is a great advantage here. You would find that most people who have the means would share water from their bore holes, or ‘share’ their electricity by allowing their friends and neighbours to watch television or keep foodstuff in their refrigerators, or in some cases, even allow others to connect to their generators for power supply. Now, those with extra capacity can monetise this service and because of the financial incentive, contribute to the generation capacity of the national grid. The intelligent energy management and data driven predictive control system utilising Machine Learning for optimising the energy management system operations and the visualisation dashboard are currently being developed and tested in the UK. A small-scale pilot will be deployed in a community in Abuja, where energy sharing between a secondary school and private local buildings will be trialed. Although there are few hundred of houses in the community, about 10 of them will be involved in the trials. Once the test bed is up and running, interested stakeholders, policymakers, government officials and the public will be invited to see and assess the benefits of the concept to the wider society. Results from the pilot and the simulated mini-grid based at Manchester Metropolitan University Engineering Laboratory will be used to develop an attractive business model for schools, businesses and other consumers to locate solar and battery storage on-site, while providing low cost electricity supply to the community.
Constant power supply has been a major challenge in Nigeria; in what other ways do you think Nigeria can find a lasting solution to it?
I think it is important for all hands to be on deck here. It is not just a problem for government; it is a societal challenge. First, we need to realize that we are the government, we voted for those in power, but more important, as individuals, we feel it when there is no power. Industry feels it, homes feel it. Inadequate power supply is partly responsible for our national economic difficulties; our national economic growth would depend on a sustainable solution to this challenge, to state the obvious.
So, we need to admit the scale of the problem and ascribe the urgency it requires to it. I would encourage everyone in society to look inward for answers to the questions we are quick to throw at the authorities; and this project is just one way to do that. There is much evidence to support how Nigerians, as a community and resilient people have provided innovative solutions to other problems. Take for instance, in the 1950s, many who could not afford to study abroad relied on their communities to fund their journeys, either as grants or loans. This was done outside the official banking sector.
We should be thinking of a bottom up approach, rather than the top down approach of expecting government to provide every service. The potential is huge if communities could start building on the rich national resources in solar power to provide energy. We need to take responsibility for production and efficient consumption. If we think of the energy as ours, we would find a way to generate and use it efficiently.
We also need to know such basic things as how much energy is required, what is our current capacity, how much more capacity can we build into the system and by what means? How can we have sustainable energy production and consumption? I do not think the problem is wholly that of government, manpower or even inadequate resources. There is part of it that is about ownership. One solution might be for individual communities to take responsibility for producing enough for its people, then think about sharing excess capacity to other communities, via the national grid.
Recently, the Senate in Nigeria proposed a bill for the ban of importation of generating sets into the country; do you think it is a step in the right direction? And what is the economic Implication of that?
It appears that this is a simplistic solution, targeted at a sector- diesel generator suppliers. Electricity, like all other commodities, responds to the economic law of demand and supply. Demand for generators is a result of demand for electricity. In fact, diesel generators are not the cheapest source of energy. Therefore, their popularity among individuals and businesses is only due to lack of cheaper and more sustainable alternatives.
The bill will only mean banning generators without providing alternative sources of electricity. This will certainly impinge on available electricity for industry. What we really want is cheaper electricity by increasing capacity, rather than banning generators, which at least is bridging the capacity gap at the moment. We should focus more on projects to produce power. When there is enough capacity in the system at affordable costs, generators will be naturally phased out of our system.
How would you assess the contribution of Nigerians in the Diaspora in the development of their home country?
Having lived in the United Kingdom for some years now, I have associated with Nigerians in the Diaspora. I am also in touch with friends, family and academic colleagues who are in Nigeria. I know that Nigerians remit billions of dollars back home to support families, or to charitable causes. We come to Nigeria to visit as academics, members of advisory boards, public and private consultants. Medical doctors come to hospitals, giving of their time and resources. Some have left enviable jobs abroad to come home and volunteer as government officials. Frankly speaking, some have found their return quite challenging because there is no enabling environment. In the UK and other Western countries, you work in a culture that encourages innovation and you have more opportunities. I am not saying these countries are perfect, or even that opportunities are wide open, but people are well recognised for their achievements, and the environment enables them to achieve more.
India has developed its own version of the Silicon Valley, largely because several of the computer and IT specialists who did well in the US have returned home. I believe many Nigerians would want to do the same if there was an enabling environment. Sometimes, we ask the question how much Nigeria values the expertise of her people in the Diaspora, especially when we see how much the same expertise is valued by their hosts. I know for example that the Diaspora community has been asking for the right to vote in elections, but that hasn’t happened. I have friends from the US, Brazil and other countries who live in the UK but can vote in their countries’ elections. Countries such as Singapore moved from third to first world by creating a ministry for the Diaspora. When citizens returned, they were paid what they would have been paid by their host countries.
I am proudly Nigerian, although I live outside of the country at the moment. I am convinced that contribution of Nigerians in the Diaspora would go a long way in addressing some of the challenges we currently face as a country. That is, in fact, why I am involved in the NICE project.
Considering the situation in other countries of the world, do you think Nigerian government has done enough in the fight against Covid-19 pandemic?
Looking at where Nigeria is in the current development index, I will say you can’t give what you do not have. Government has given what they have, but that raises the question whether that is the best.
The time of adversity is not the best time to run helter-skelter. It’s the time to discharge the results of your research and innovation prior to this time. Nigeria does not seem to have a homegrown reliable model of the reproduction or severity values of the novel virus, nor reliable forecast of the number of cases, deaths, bed requirements per region, and so on. Usually, these models are built by Universities in collaboration with relevant government departments and interested partners from the private sector to inform logical decisions.
I hope there will be a time afterwards when we can review the situation and learn from it in readiness for any future pandemic or disaster. Different sectors should be looked at to see how all could work together in a proactive manner to plan for the future. Words like simulation, pre-emptive planning, predictive analysis, among others should enter the Nigerian lexicon. In agriculture, how much food do we need in the next few years? Our budget is mostly reactionary and short term, focusing mainly on recurrent rather than relevant capital expenditure. Proactive and strategic planning now will prepare us if there is a future disaster.
Having studied in Nigeria and now a Professor in the UK, what is your advice to the Nigerian government regarding the educational system?
It is difficult to judge the Nigerian educational system because it is unlike other parts of the world. There is a huge divide between haves and have nots; private and public universities. Majority of institutions lack the amenities and facilities for excellent research and education, but there are still a few good ones. We desperately need to bridge the academic divide between the institutions that have nothing and those that can be considered reputable. This is important, because if the majority of workers come out of substandard universities, they will get into the labour market unprepared.
Our educational system also needs to take account of the now and plan for the future. Some of the public secondary schools and universities still live in the past. The curriculum, textbooks, laboratory equipment, attitude to research, could do with a bit of upgrade. Let’s take History as an example; do our children know as much about Nigeria as they should? In the UK, I’ve spoken to Brits who studied physics and could tell you all about UK history. This is because history is well taught from primary school. In Nigeria, history is more for the professionals; you begin to learn it properly at senior secondary or when you are at the University. I understand History has perhaps now been taken out of the Secondary School curriculum completely. How then are the children supposed to learn about our country? We need to review our curriculum to make them fit for purpose and help in developing confident future leaders who are secure in their identity and have the positive values that would have positive impact on the society. This malaise in the educational system will partly explain why we tend to copy and paste rather than develop a system for our country. Our technology should focus on locally and culturally relevant outputs; our entire national philosophy should reflect in our education, because our leaders are by-products of our universities.
Moreover, in such a pluralistic society, there is insufficient emphasis on diversity, disability, gender among others. In the UK, there are four distinct peoples in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Each knows enough about its culture to understand its identity and its place in the United Kingdom. In the world, it is estimated that 15 percent of all people have a disability. Looking after them means that you can get a singer like Stevie Wonder, a deaf swimmer from South Africa (Terence Parkin) who won silver in the Sydney Olympics, several blind scientists in NASA, and other high achieving people with different disabilities. What plans do we have for persons with disabilities among us? What plans do we have to increase the number of women in STEM academic disciplines?
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