SOLTRAIN 2 – Southern African Solar Thermal Training and Demonstration Initiative

Partners of the project are three universities, the Sustainable Energy Society of Southern Africa (SESSA) and solar thermal industries.

Within the project awareness raising campaigns, establishing of competence centres and solar thermal technology platforms and installation of demonstration plants are the main fields of activity.

Through the awareness raising campaigns relevant stakeholders and interested community members get informed about the broad field of solar thermal applications and their impact on security of energy supply, poverty, creation of jobs and environment.

Institutional structures at universities, universities of applied sciences and at the Sustainable Energy Society of Southern Africa will be established for know-how-transfer, training, technical support of local industries and supporting politics. Within these structures research and development competence will be set up.

Solar Thermal Technology Platforms contribute to cross-linking of all relevant stakeholders like solar thermal industries and suppliers of components, universities and schools, politics and administration for accelerated dispersal and use of solar thermal plants and preparing road maps for implementing solar thermal systems. An interstate technology platform for Southern Africa will intensify cooperation and information transfer. To apply the knowledge build up in trainings for craftsmen, students or responsible politicians in practice, 40 to 50 demonstration plants will be installed and will show various applications of solar thermal covering hot-water and cooling applications in hospitals and children’s homes as well as heat for industrial processes in the food and beverage industry.

Solar heat for the Cape Brewing Company

Video about the SOLTRAIN session at the SAIREC Conference, October 2019 in Cape Town.