A “Regional Dialogue on Energy Auditing Schemes” concluded in Kathmandu today.  The three day event (13-15 May 2013) was attended by more than 30 policy makers, experts and representatives from relevant institutions from Bangladesh, Germany, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Representative from SAARC Energy Cell also participated in the event.

Energy audit is one of the most important energy efficiency activity supported by almost all the governments throughout the world. There are specific energy conservation and energy promotional acts giving a thrust on energy efficiency and energy management.  Many countries (such as India, Sri Lanka etc.) have a full-fledged energy bureaus or energy authorities to formulate, manage and implement energy audit activities in the energy intensive industries. Many countries see energy efficiency and audit activities as a measure to reduce their energy intensity.

The most immediate problem faced by Bangladesh & Nepal is to organize system for accreditation and certification of energy auditors in their countries. As of now, Nepal has 45 energy auditors trained in the frame of the Nepal Energy Efficiency Programme (NEEP). Next steps are yet to be systematically structured.

The Regional Dialogue served as a knowledge and experience exchange platform for energy auditing schemes prevailing in the participating countries. As different countries are in different phases of energy auditing scheme, the open discussions and moderated exchange among experts gave insights on the best practices and the challenges, especially from the countries which has already implemented the scheme since long. The possible steps for overcoming the barriers; quality assurance of the energy auditing as well as financing of EA schemes was discussed extensively.

The event aimed at providing opportunity to participants from Nepal and Bangladesh to identify and select the best practices which could be adapted for the country and the approaches to further the same; while for the other countries, it provided opportunity to review their existing energy auditing scheme and see what can still be improved, identify the point of convergence and divergence.  A strong need for regional cooperation for the Energy Auditing Scheme as well as Energy Managers Scheme was spelt out among the participating countries; possibility of engaging SAARC as an enabling platform was also discussed.

The event was organized under the Regional Energy Efficiency Programme (REEP) of German Development Cooperation - GIZ, India on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

It is great to see the lively exchange of so many South Asian countries on the crucial topic of energy efficiency – says Dr. M. Pervaz from SAARC Energy Centre. Expressing his comments on the three day events he states his conviction that that some ideas and concept shared during the progamme will find their way from one country to the other and be implemented in the next couple of years.

For further information, please contact:  Dr. Rolf Posorski (rolf.posorski@giz.de) or Anita Sharma (anita.sharma@giz.de)