11/11/2014
The FIIAPP holds the fourth executive progress meeting of the “Institutional Strengthening of Jordan's National Electric Power Company (NEPCO)” project. All the institutions involved in the project, financed by the European Commission, presented the progress made in the first year of work and their different challenges, accomplishments and strategies for the future.
Grupo de expertos españoles y jordanos visitan la planta fotovoltaica gestamp en españaA group of Spanish and Jordanian experts visits the Gestamp photovoltaic plant in Spain
On 5th November, the fourth progress meeting of this FIIAPP-managed energy project was held in Amman, Jordan.
This Twinning project aims to build the technical capacities of NEPCO (Jordan’s National Electric Power Company) so as to improve the performance, operation and maintenance of the country’s electrical grid so that Jordan can address the challenges it is currently facing in supply and demand by incorporating renewable energies.
The project has a duration of two years and involves a great work effort and profound changes in how Jordanian engineers work. Today it can be said that the objective of building the capacity of the Jordanian engineers to address the challenge of integrating energy produced from renewable sources in the management of the electrical grid has nearly been met.
At the moment, on a day-to-day level, work is being done on objectives such as: building the capacity of NEPCO staff to establish better methods in strategic planning and management; upgrading the capacity and skills of technical staff in the use, design and operation of simulators; improving planning in the transmission process and in management, while maximizing efficiency and reducing costs and environmental impact; building the capacity and skills of NEPCO staff in maintenance of the control system (balance between supply and demand with limited capacity); and reducing the vulnerability of the Jordanian electrical system to failures in international interconnections it shares with neighbouring countries (Egypt and Syria).
All the stakeholder institutions in the project attended the meeting: the Institute for Energy Diversification and Saving (IDAE), the Spanish Electrical Network (REE), FIIAPP, NEPCO, the Jordanian Ministry of International Cooperation and Planning and the European Union Delegation in Jordan. They are all satisfied with and enthusiastic about the work completed to date, as the progress made in implementation of the project is significant.
This project for Strengthening the Capacities of Jordan’s National Electric Power Company (NEPCO) took part in an impact assessment organized by iniciativa i2i of the World Bankfrom 13th to 17th October in Lisbon.
This is the first FIIAPP-managed project that has asked to become actively involved in the design of an impact assessment and to seek a strategic partnership with the World Bank. The objective is to measure the effectiveness of the training of NEPCO’s staff in its adaptation to the new context for supplying energy, based on the introduction of renewables, which will be established over the course of 2015. The FIIAPP assessment project thereby joins a doctrine of experimental assessments that will be innovative in the area of public policy management and applied research on a global level and in a sector that is of strategic interest for Europe and the Middle East like the introduction and improvement of technical and management capacities in the supply of energy.
