Engr. Okon Nsekenyin Ekpenyong is an energy and environment expert, with focus on national energy policy formulation, analysis and development energy policy implementation plans. As a Director with the Energy Commission of Nigeria (a Federal Government agency) with over 27 years of working experience, he facilitated the development of the nation’s National Energy Policy (NEP) and the National Energy Master Plan (NEMP) that promotes sustainable energy development with emphasis on energy efficiency and conservation best practices and new/renewable energy deployment as key climate change mitigation measures in Nigeria as articulated in the Nigeria’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), which this project is anchored on.
With his electrical and mechanical engineering background, he is the principal initiator of the project: “Scaling-Up Energy-Efficient and Climate-Friendly Cooling in Nigeria”. Therefore, he serves as the National Project Director, who monitors the project implementation to ensure that project’s activities carried out under the project meet national energy and climate goals and plans.
Etiosa has over 15 years experience working in the field of sustainable energy and climate change. He has been active in conducting energy and climate change research and promoting sustainable energy. He has served as the Coordinator and National Expert in several sustainable energy projects in Nigeria. He is currently serving as the National Coordinator for the Project, supervising the implementation of the activities to achieve the objectives of the Project.
Nkechi Isaac is a seasoned communicator with over a decade of experience in communication consultancy in the areas of energy, climate change and science communication. She oversees and leads awareness and promotional campaigns of the project to bring about ownership and buy-in in Nigeria with regards to clean cooling.
Osamede Onuvae is a researcher with focus on clean energy and data analysis. She has over 10 years experience working and consulting in the area of monitoring and evaluation, conducting surveys, project management and Environmental Impact Assessments. Osamede has strong quantitative skills and leads major baseline assessments.
She conducts market assessment for the project. The assessment will empower policymakers and regulators to make informed decisions for updating the Minimum Energy Performance Standards (MEPS) as well as serve as a baseline for measuring the regulation's impact once enforcement begins for the recommended MEPS and labels.
Brian manages a diverse portfolio of refrigeration and air conditioning projects for UNEP’s United for Efficiency initiative, accelerating the transition to energy-efficient and climate-friendly solutions in emerging markets. Over the past 16 years, he has been fostering sustainable energy partnerships across sectors and borders, achieving breakthroughs with ambitious minimum energy performance standards and energy labels, consumer finance schemes, capacity building programmes, and market monitoring and enforcement protocols.
Marco is an Energy Efficiency and Cooling Specialist at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). He manages projects globally for the establishment of energy efficiency regulations and programmes, link climate and sustainable cooling targets and develops policy support tools to transition markets to more efficient and climate-friendly cooling technologies.
Miquel Pitarch holds a Ph.D. in refrigeration and air conditioning systems (RAC) and serves as an international expert consultant for energy efficiency projects within UNEP's United for Efficiency (U4E) initiative. He has collaborated closely with several countries, including Nigeria, Sudan, Chile, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, and Cuba.
His role in the Nigerian project is to support the market assessment studies, provide recommendations for the implementation of Minimum Energy Performance Standards (MEPS) and labels for air conditioners, and provide guidance and training on Monitoring, Verification, and Enforcement (MVE) related to energy efficiency policies
Rhoda is the head of the Energy Unit in the Africa office of UNEP. The unit focuses on advancing uptake of renewable energy and energy efficiency in Africa. She joined UNEP in 2013 and has extensive experience working on green economy, sustainable consumption and production and resource efficiency in Africa.