Twinning Workshop on Energy-Efficient and Climate-Friendly ...

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Twinning Workshop on Energy-Efficient and Climate-Friendly Refrigeration and Air

Conditioning: Pacific Island Countries

1-2 October 2018, Bangkok, Thailand

WORKSHOP REPORT

With support from

In cooperation with

By StewyOz - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=34502980

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Table of contents

1. Background ......................................................................................................................................................... 3

2. Workshop objectives ......................................................................................................................................... 3

3. Workshop participants ....................................................................................................................................... 4

4. Pre-workshop survey ......................................................................................................................................... 5

5. Key takeaways ................................................................................................................................................... 6

6. Workshop evaluation ......................................................................................................................................... 8

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1. Background The “Twinning Workshop on Energy-Efficient and Climate-Friendly Refrigeration and Air Conditioning” for Pacific Island Countries (PICs), was held in Bangkok, Thailand, from 1-2 October 2018. The event was organized jointly by UN Environment’s (UNEP) OzonAction and United for Efficiency initiatives, in cooperation with the international engineering society ASHRAE, and hosted by the UN Environment Regional Office in Bangkok. It was the fourth in a series of regional workshops taking place over a two-year period as part of a project aimed at building the capacity of National Ozone Officers (NOOs) and national energy policymakers (NEPs) for linking energy efficiency with the objectives of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer in support of the Kigali Amendment. UN Environment is implementing this project with support from the Kigali Cooling Efficiency Programme (K-CEP), a philanthropic initiative that is committing $52 million to help developing countries transition to energy-efficient, climate-friendly, affordable cooling solutions. The Kigali Amendment, which enters into force on 1 January 2019, will help protect the climate by phasing down high global warming potential (GWP) hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), which are commonly used as refrigerants. Promoting energy efficiency of air conditioning and refrigeration technology can significantly increase those climate co-benefits, and those were the main topics discussed during the twinning workshop.

The PICs workshop participants

All relevant information about the workshop (agenda, logistics note, list of participants, background documents, presentations, additional materials, photos, and reports) are available on the OzonAction Meeting Portal (www.ozonactionmeetings.org).

2. Workshop objectives The overall objective of the workshop was to initiate and/or strengthen the collaboration between National Ozone Officers and Energy Efficiency officials in the member countries of the relevant Regional Networks of Ozone Officers. Through this forum, the national counterparts had an opportunity to exchange experiences and share knowledge between themselves about the energy efficiency opportunities presented by the Kigali amendment, and to identify possible areas of collaboration on how their countries could promote an energy-

http://www.ozonactionmeetings.org/

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efficient refrigerant transition. Although the focus of the workshop was to initiate or strengthen a national stakeholder dialogue, the participants also benefited from cross-country experience sharing. The workshop’s objective was achieved through an interactive, participatory approach that included different session formats, a mix of presentation types, theoretical content as well as practical demonstrations, plenary discussions, regional group discussions and a set of participant exercises, all specifically designed to guide and facilitate a dialogue between the national counterparts. The “disruptive” workshop format was designed to avoid participants sitting and receiving information in a static manner; instead, it maximized changes to format, divisions of groups according to different criteria, and room changes to promote mixing and interaction. The workshop agenda is attached to this report. The participants were also provided with additional background material such as a K-CEP Twinning Project Factsheet, OzonAction’s Kigali Timeline poster, U4E’s Policy guide – Accelerating the Global Adoption of Energy-Efficient Air Conditioners, U4E’s Policy Guide – Accelerating the Global Adoption of Energy-Efficient and Climate-Friendly Refrigerators, ASHRAE-OzonAction Refrigerants Factsheet, IEA’s The Future of Cooling, and TEAP’s Energy Efficiency Workgroup Report from October 2017. UN Environment also provided each delegation with the U4E Country Savings Policy Assessment for Refrigerator and Air-Conditioner Sectors tailor-made for their country.

Participants during the technology demonstration session and exercise session

3. Workshop participants In total, the workshop included 47 participants, with the following composition:

• All 14 Pacific Island Countries (100%) participated in the workshop; • 60 % of the participants were country representatives (28 out of 47), 21% were resource persons and

experts (10 out of 47) and 19% were UN Environment representatives (9 out of 47);

• In the group of country representatives, 57% were NOOs (16 out of 28) and 43% were NEPs (12 out of 28);

• 86% of country delegations had a NEP representative (12 out of 14), including two delegations that only had a NEP representative. Twenty-nine (29%) of country delegations had two NOO representatives1 (4 out of 14).

In terms of gender distribution, 38% of the workshop participants (18 out of 47) and 30% of speakers (6 out of 20) were women. In the group of NOOs, 56% were women (9 out of 16) and in the group of NEPs, 17% were women (2 out of 12).

1 K-CEP project funds were used to fund participation of one NOO per country, other NOU participants were self-funded.

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A list of the countries and organisations who participated at the workshop is presented in the table below:

Country representatives from PICs (Article 5 countries)

Others

• Cook Islands

• Fiji

• Kiribati

• Marshall Islands

• Micronesia (Federated States of)

• Nauru

• Niue

• Palau

• Papua New Guinea

• Samoa

• Solomon Islands

• Tonga

• Tuvalu

• Vanuatu

• Kigali Cooling Efficiency Program (K-CEP)

• ASHRAE

• Association of Development Financing Institutions in the Pacific

• International Energy Agency (IEA)

• International Institute for Energy Conservation (IIEC)

• Office of Vocational Education Commission, Ministry of Education, Thailand

• Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC)

• UN Environment: OzonAction, United for Efficiency

4. Pre-workshop survey UN Environment conducted a pre-workshop survey to determine an informal baseline of knowledge using the https://www.surveymonkey.com portal. Participants were asked to provide an answer to 9 questions (survey questions are available on the OzonAction meeting portal). All questions had multiple-choice answers and, in some cases, an option to provide additional text or comments. In total, 28 participants (60%) responded (13 NOOs, 14 NEPs and 1 other participant). This meeting’s pre-workshop survey had the highest response rate of the country representatives – 93% of them provided input. The key messages from the pre-workshop survey were, as follows:

• Around 50% of NOOs and 50% of NEPs indicated that they had worked previously with their national counterpart.

• Energy efficiency in the RAC sector is rated as quite important (9 on a scale of 1-10).

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10

9

Meeting participants

PICs countryrepresentatives

Resourcepersons

UNEnvironment

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9

102

12

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Gender structure

Male NOO

Female NOO

Male NEP

Female NEP

Male OTH

Female OTH

https://www.surveymonkey.com/

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• Most participants had previous knowledge of the Kigali Amendment (21% very knowledgeable, 36% moderately knowledgeable and 18% some understanding).

• Reduced dependency on imported fuel/electricity and mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions are the highest rated drivers for pursuing energy efficiency improvements (57%), followed by reducing burden of electrical utility bills for consumers/businesses and mitigation of environmental pollution (50%).

• Most countries already have in place different combinations of programmes and/or policies for RAC equipment. Half of the survey respondents indicated that they had in place or planned to have a National Energy Action Plan and certification of RAC technicians (50%). Measure with the highest number of answers was Minimum energy performance standards – MEPS (61%).

• Capacity building activities on new technologies for practitioners (86%) and for officials on model policies and programmes (75%) are the activities indicated as the most useful for promoting energy efficiency in the RAC sector. Participants also indicated as very useful product demonstrations to show benefits of new technologies (75%).

When asked to provide their expectations for the workshop, 64% of respondents indicated that they were hoping to better understand the options for national policies, 18% were expecting to better understand synergies between the work of the two counterparts and 11% indicated that they were looking for the opportunity to discuss energy efficiency and RAC issues in detail with their counterpart. Around 4% indicated that they already had a good cooperation on the national level and success stories to share with other participants. A complete analysis of the responses is available on the OzonAction Meeting Portal.

5. Key takeaways The main discussion points and issues raised during the workshop are grouped by topic and summarized in this section. Note that these are not official recommendations and they were not approved by the participants. Institutional cooperation • Energy efficiency and refrigerant management responsibilities and programs are handled by various

agencies and offices. There is a need for more information exchange and materials on potential linkages

between the two areas.

• There is cooperation between NOOs and NEPs in general, but for the majority of the countries it is very

basic. Exchange programmes and information mechanisms should be introduced in the countries. For

example, NEPs focus on energy and often do not take environmental issues into consideration, and

NOUs focus on the refrigeration and air conditioning sector, but usually do not take energy efficiency

into account.

• There is a need to make it easier for energy officials to understand why refrigerants matter and how to

incorporate refrigerant choices into energy policies and programmes.

• There is a recognition that cooperation is needed on the technical level, but it doesn’t translate to the

higher levels. NOOs need a boost, ozone issues are not a priority, focus is more on climate – the Kigali

Amendment is the boost for the Ozone Officers, since HFCs only have climate implications.

• Besides NOOs and NEPs, climate change experts should be involved in the discussions.

• The Kigali Amendment can be used for awareness raising and advocating the policy makers on win-win-

win situation – addressing the CO2 emissions and energy efficiency issues, while phasing-down HFC

refrigerants.

• Enabling Activities projects can be used for consultations and awareness raising between the two

stakeholder groups.

• The countries should consider establishing processes and mechanisms to cooperate between the

energy and the ozone and to sensitize higher levels.

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• It is important to share information within the countries in the region (e.g. Palau has a solar home loan

program, and the idea for that initially came from another country).

• The Pacific Island Countries prefer to use regional approaches when possible (regional standards and

labelling schemes, bulk procurement, applying for projects).

Capacity building

• Human and technical capacity in the ministries and staff turnover are the biggest challenge in moving

things forward (e.g. energy division only has two people, NOU has one Ozone Officer).

• Countries should consider the possibility of organizing regional-level training for trainers so that they

can train a number of stakeholders at the national level. Joint trainings and certification on both

refrigerants and energy efficiency aspects could be considered. The Secretariat of the Pacific

Community (SPC) could serve in an organizational capacity.

• There is a problem of quantifying effectiveness of the training and translating it to the higher levels. For

example, when NOO organizes training of the customs officers, there is a visible benefit in a form of

revenue, because the imports are tariffed correctly. UN Environment should come up with a Factsheet

on how to quantify effects of the trainings.

• More work needs to be done on awareness raising and convincing consumers to buy energy-efficient

equipment.

• The Secretariat of the Pacific Community can be used as a source of technical support and expertise.

National policies

• Key items in the policy toolkit are: policies e.g. Minimum Energy Performance Standards (MEPS),

labelling; consumer information to inform purchasing decisions; and incentives. These policies work best

when used in combination.

• MEPS are the most successful policy measure for market transformation, if they are well designed,

implemented, and enforced.

• U4E is developing model policies that could be used by countries when setting energy efficiency

standards.

• In the PICs, policies and standards are in place, mostly set up through the PALS project (Pacific Appliance

Labelling and Standards) and implemented through SPC.

• In the PICs, energy efficiency initiatives are done only when funding is available, not treated as priority;

development partners are assisting. SPC has a coordination role in energy efficiency standards and

policy setting.

• Regionally harmonized policies can help each country in the region, because it is easier for

manufacturers to enter the market and it is also easier for policymakers in the government to monitor

the situation in the country.

• When setting policies and standards, countries should reference lessons learned from other countries

(there is no need to start from scratch). Twenty-seven (27) countries in the world are developing their

National Cooling plans using K-CEP funding (addressing energy efficiency while trying to reduce

consumption of HFCs); when finished, they can be used as source of inspiration for other countries.

• NOOs and NEPs should ensure that there is no conflict of interest when setting policy measures (e.g.

countries should avoid introducing tax exemptions for energy efficient equipment that uses a restricted

or high-GWP refrigerant).

• Green public procurement is one way of including both energy efficiency and the choice of refrigerant

considerations. Government tenders should, when possible, require energy performance labels and

energy efficient product requirements.

• Bulk procurement can reduce purchase price and the equipment can be offered to the consumers at

the same price as cheaper and energy inefficient equipment. If regional approach is taken, funding

could be obtained from the banks. (example of EESL’s UJALA project in India, the world’s largest

domestic lighting replacement programme).

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• Discussion should be started on how to reflect refrigerants on the label.

• Some countries have financial incentives in place (e.g. tax exemption for equipment that has an Energy

Star label).

• There is a general lack of data since there is no data collection requirement in the legislation.

Enforcement • Monitoring, verification and enforcement are crucial for the success of introduced measures.

• The government can establish testing laboratories, or they can recognize the test results for products

that are evaluated at other accredited laboratories in another country or via self-declarations from the

manufacturer, as long as there is a protocol to spot check these results on occasion by an accredited 3rd

party lab.

• Whether or not the country should consider setting up the testing laboratory depends on the market size and structure of equipment coming in. If the market is too small, regional approach could be considered. The following institutions can help: IIEC, U4E, CTCN.

• Testing facilities should be accredited.

• SPC will make a list of accredited testing laboratories and share it with the countries.

• U4E has a model regulation for countries to start and GEF funding can be used for enhanced compliance

support in some regions.

Resources for implementing policies and programmes • Governments need funding to develop and implement energy efficiency policies and programs.

• While outside support (e.g. via the GEF, Climate Technology Centre and Network, and others) can offset

the start-up costs, it is imperative that over the medium and long-term that budget (perhaps

supplemented by fees) be dedicated to maintaining this work over time.

• Countries need help with facilitating access to funding at the local and regional level for energy

efficiency programmes.

• Tools and guidance are available from a variety of sources to support energy-efficiency policies,

including United for Efficiency, Super-efficient Equipment and Appliance Deployment Initiative, Global

Lighting and Energy Access Partnership, International Energy Agency, GIZ, ASHRAE, and beyond.

• Multilateral Fund supported Enabling Activities projects can be used to revise legislation (ozone-, climate,

and energy- related) to prepare strategies needed for the HFC phase-down. Enabling Activities could

include consultations with energy-efficiency stakeholders in relation to the refrigeration and air

conditioning sector.

Equipment and technology choices • Equipment design and efficiency is impacted by the type of refrigerant, size, condenser design, etc. The

refrigerant choice also impacts the type of material going into products. • China is one of the biggest producers. If there were requirements on the manufacturers side, all importing

countries would receive energy-efficient equipment. China has MEPS in place but those do not apply to

the exported equipment. The pressure can be made from the users’ side if the importing countries set

the standards at a large scale (regional approach), that would be a strong signal to producers in China.

One possibility would be a joint declaration of PICs on not wanting to accept substandard equipment.

• Experience of the NOOs in the existing Montreal Protocol mechanisms that are in place to prevent

dumping of used and obsolete equipment in the developing countries can be useful for NEPs.

6. Workshop evaluation UN Environment conducted an evaluation at the end of workshop. The evaluation questionnaire had 8 questions, and participants were asked to rate the content of the workshop and each session, provide their feedback on specific aspects of the workshop, but also to identify topics of interest for the next workshop to be held in 2019. Feedback was received from 33 participants (70% of all meeting participants) who

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completed the evaluation questionnaire (16 NOOs, 10 NEPs and 6 others, one participant didn’t indicate their designation). The response rate for three different groups of participants was 100% for NOOs, 83% for NEPs and 32% for others. When asked to perform an overall evaluation of the workshop, half of participants rated the workshop as ‘excellent’ and around 40% rated it as ‘good’. One participant rated the ‘Quality of the workshop materials’ as ‘poor’. No one rated the workshop as ‘very poor’. When asked to reflect on their expectations from the twinning workshop, 76% of participants said that their expectations were met, 24% that they were exceeded. Participants were asked to provide feedback on the technical level of the workshop content. Around two thirds of participants thought that it was suitable, and around one quarter (24%) thought it was advanced. Three (3%) of participants thought that the technical level was too advanced and 6% thought it was basic. This was also reflected in some participants’ comments. Participants were also asked to rate each session of the workshop, on the scale 1-5, with 5 being the highest score. All sessions achieved similar rating scores, ranging from 4.1 to 4.43. The highest average score was given to the ‘Introduction to Energy Efficiency for NOOs’ (4.43) and ‘Introduction to Refrigerants for NEPs’ (4.43). Two lowest average scores were given to the ‘Regional Challenges and Opportunities in PICs’ (4.15) and ‘Exercise: National Policy Brainstorming’ (4.10). Participants were given the opportunity to share take-home messages or any other thing they wanted to highlight. Some of the responses received are:

• To build on a local synergy between different agencies for a successful implementation. • Joint consultation will help boost the Kigali amendment implementation work. Prioritize and manage

legislation with partner departments and stakeholders to implement activities.

• Great need for NOO and NEP collaboration, ability to distil complex systems into digestible content for people who are not technically savvy. Careful deliberation of methods of delivering regulatory and legislative plans with key stakeholders.

• Collaboration with NEP on HPMP Stage II and Kigali amendment implementation. Sensitizing policymakers on the synergies and benefits of HFC phase-down.

• Need continuous training for new technology and not for NOO but for NEP. • a) Allow more time for ozone officers and energy officers to understand national situation; b) More joint

trainings and c) Training at national level to involve more national stakeholders. • I suggest that this kind of meeting/workshop will be organized and conducted annually to enhance

collaboration of two parties – the NOO and NEPs. • Do that which you can do. Ask questions, learn from relevant people in your circle… All things are possible

to do.

• Please be climate-friendly and energy efficient and help save our world for our future generation. • Working together is essential to achieve objectives of both ozone/energy in regards to energy efficiency. • Close collaboration between NOO and NEP on sharing the available data, will help boost the priorities on

energy policies and also HCFC plan to achieve goal. • Continue running training workshop in the future, to enhance capacity of stakeholders.

• This training was very informative and excellent in all the agendas discussed so far, however it was very short (2 days) and I believe there were lots of areas to be covered. So, for the next workshop training, we should consider increasing the length of training time.

• It may help country efforts if Regional obligations and gaps could be mapped so leaders can see opportunities.

The question about future activities was asked in the pre-meeting survey and it was repeated in the evaluation questionnaire. Participants were asked to select and prioritize future activities needed to promote energy efficiency in the refrigeration and air conditioning sector in their country, based on what they have learned in the workshop. Responses of non-country representatives are not considered in the analysis.

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Based on the answers to this question, most of the listed future activities are relevant for the countries. Activity marked as the highest priority ‘Capacity building on model policies and programmes’ (96%) followed by ‘Information about financial mechanisms’ (73%). In the answers provided by the participants before the meeting, the highest importance was given to the Capacity building tools, for RAC technicians (86%) and for officials on model policies and programmes (75%). Respondents also highly rated Product demonstrations to show the benefits of new technologies (75%). It seems that, as a result of the workshop, more participants prioritize the need to have capacity building on model policies and programmes.

A complete workshop evaluation is available on the OzonAction Meeting Portal.

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Annex 1: Workshop Agenda

AGENDA Monday, 1 October

Event facilitator: Pipat Poopeerasupong, OzonAction

9:00

OPENING

Welcome Prayer

Welcome

Isabelle Louis, Deputy Regional Director, UN Environment, Asia and the Pacific

Perspectives on Energy Efficient Cooling and Kigali Amendment

Jim Curlin, OzonAction, UN Environment

K-CEP and Cooling in the Pacific

Dan Hamza-Goodacre, Director, Kigali Cooling Efficiency Programme

09:35 GROUP PHOTO

09:50 OBJECTIVES AND INTRODUCTIONS

Objectives

Brian Holuj, United for Efficiency, UN Environment

Pre-Workshop Survey Results

Sonja Wagner, Montreal Protocol Consultant, UN Environment

EXERCISE: Ice Breaker

Get to know your fellow representative from the country

10:20 COFFEE/TEA BREAK

10:35 INTRODUCTIONS TO ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND THE KIGALI AMENDMENT –

PARALLEL SESSIONS

Group 1: Energy Efficiency for National Ozone Officers


• What is energy and energy efficiency • Context on air conditioners and refrigerators • How refrigerants and energy efficiency are linked • Relationship between the Kigali Amendment and Paris Climate Agreement • Main energy efficiency stakeholders • Role of national energy policymakers

• Questions & Answers

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Group 2: Refrigerants for National Energy Policymakers


• What are refrigerants and the role of the cooling sector • Definitions

• How energy efficiency and refrigerants are linked • Relationship between the Paris Climate Agreement and Kigali Amendment • Main Montreal Protocol stakeholders • Role of National Ozone Officers • Typical national ozone protection programmes, policies & activities

• Questions & Answers

11:30 TECHNOLOGY OVERVIEW

Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Technology

Apichit Lumlertpongpana, ASHRAE

Hands-on Technology Demonstration

Taweesak Malaivichit and Piyawat Amornpiyakkit, Office of Vocational Education Commission, Ministry of Education, Thailand

Questions & Answers

13:00 LUNCH

14:00 NATIONAL CONTEXT AND RELATIONSHIP BUILDING

EXERCISE: Explain the National Context – Montreal Protocol

NOO provides the NEP from their country with an overview of refrigerant-related plans and programmes

EXERCISE: Explain the National Context – Energy Efficiency

NEP provides the NOO from their country with an overview of relevant national energy policies and programmes

14:40 POLICIES FOR TRANSFORMING REFRIGERATION AND AIR CONDITIONING

MARKETS

Introduction to Market Transformation

Emily McQualter, Energy Analyst, International Energy Agency

Questions and answers


16:00 Examples of Transforming Cooling Markets with Model Policies and Programmes

Makereta Lomaloma, Energy Efficiency Advisory, SPC Secretariat, session moderator

• Benjamin S. Wakefield, Marshall Islands

• Koreti Leilani Tagiilima, Samoa

• Willie Obed, Vanuatu

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16:45 STAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS AND ENGAGEMENT

EXERCISE: Mapping Who Does What

NOO and NEP work together to map key stakeholders in their country involved in Montreal Protocol and energy efficiency, and identify methods for engaging these audiences

17:10 CLOSING

Sudhir Sharma, UN Environment Asia and the Pacific

17:15 ADJOURN

18:00 RECEPTION

Tuesday, 2 October

9:00 NATIONAL POLICY OPPORTUNITIES TO UNLOCK CO-BENEFITS FOR CLIMATE AND ENERGY

Jim Curlin, OzonAction, UN Environment Linking Energy Efficiency and Refrigerant Transition Opportunities

Yogesh Gounder, Fiji

EXERCISE: National Policy Brainstorming

Facilitated discussion to identify opportunities to link HCFC Phase out Management Plans (HPMPs), Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and energy and climate policies


10:45 RESOURCES FOR IMPLEMENTING POLICIES AND PROGRAMS

Overview of Funding Opportunities and Tools to Support Market Transformation


Online Kigali Tracker and Tools

Emily McQualter, Energy Analyst, International Energy Agency

Financial Mechanisms in the Pacific Island Community

Vaine Nooana-Arioka, Managing Director of Bank of Cook Islands; Chairperson of the Association of Development Financing Institutions in the Pacific

PICs Cooling Technology Demonstration Fund

Dan Hamza-Goodacre, Director, K-CEP and Sommai Phon-Amnuaisuk, Director for Asia Pacific, IIEC

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12:15 LUNCH

13:15 REGIONAL CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES

Energy Landscape

Sudhir Sharma, UN Environment Asia and the Pacific Refrigerant Landscape

Pipat Poopeerasupong, OzonAction Asia and the Pacific

Group Discussion of Priorities for Enhancing Regional Collaboration

Bradley Ilg, Team Leader in Georesources and Energy, SPC

Sommai Phon-Amnuaisuk, Director for Asia Pacific, IIEC


15:00 REGIONAL CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES – CONTINUED

Continued Discussion of Priorities for Enhancing Regional Collaboration

Bradley Ilg, Team Leader in Georesources and Energy, SPC

Sommai Phon-Amnuaisuk, Director for Asia Pacific, IIEC

16:00 OPEN-FLOOR DISCUSSION ON WAY FORWARD

Makereta Lomaloma, Energy Efficiency Advisory, SPC Secretariat

16:30 FEEDBACK AND FUTURE NEEDS

Shaofeng Hu, OzonAction, UN Environment

EXERCISE: Tell Us What You Think and What You Need

NOOs and NEPs complete surveys about the past two days and identify specific interests for the 2019 capacity building

16:50 OFFICIAL CLOSING


17:00 ADJOURN

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