Schneider Electric awarded Intersolar Award for Innovation 2016
– Schneider Electric, the global specialist in energy management and automation and a global leader in solutions for solar solutions and energy storage power conversion chain, is the proud winner of the Intersolar Award for Innovation 2016, in the Outstanding Solar Projects category. This prestigious award recognizes solar energy projects that set a particularly inspiring example of the global energy transformation.
The winning project brought solar power and storage to 172 schools and 11 public health centers in rural Nigeria
We are honored to be recognized for our contribution to education, health and the overall standard of living in Nigeria.
A collaboration between Schneider Electric and African Energy
The project came about through an initiative of the UK Department for International Development and the state government of Lagos, Nigeria, who joined forces in an ambitious project to power public institutions with solar PV energy.
Nigeria is well known for its widespread grid outages and unstable power. In rural Nigeria, many communities depend on diesel generators, and pay a high price for harmful, polluting, unreliable power. Hospitals are often forced to close when power fails, and when life-support systems shut down, lives are lost.
To deliver on the project, the Lagos State Electricity Board (LSEB) engaged trained local Nigerian partners, and selected Schneider Electric’s Conext™ family of solar and battery-based inverter/charger systems with online monitoring. Said Lincoln Dahl, African Energy’s principal, “Conext™ XW+ models were selected for this project by LSEB because of their long-term record of reliability in Nigeria’s rugged market, as well as their patented technology to improve battery life in a solar and storage system.”
“This project is an inspiring example of global energy transformation”, says Xavier Datin, VP of the Commercial and Residential Solar Line of Business, at Schneider Electric. “Through collaboration of four partners we created a successful solution that scaled quickly for 183 sites within eight months.”
This project has benefited every community that has received a solar PV system. Water pumps now run for days; health centers can now deliver babies day and night—they no longer have to refer expecting mothers to more expensive hospitals, and the fuel costs for diesel generators have been eliminated. At schools across Lagos province, science and computer laboratories operate full time. Students can charge their tablets, phones, and personal night-lights, so they can now study into the evening hours.
