Jan Maes at Rethink Relief
Last week, Livelihoods Specialist Jan Maes represented Potential Energy at Rethink Relief, an annual “intense design workshop dedicated to creating technologies for humanitarian relief that specifically address the gap between short-term relief and long-term sustainable development.” At the workshop, Jan shared lessons from Potential Energy’s six years working in the most punishing humanitarian environments in the world and explained how the success of the still thriving Darfur Stoves Project is one example of how engineering and design are being used to solve a humanitarian problem.
Rethink Relief is organized by MIT’s D-Lab, which fosters sustainable solutions for international development, and TU Delft’s Industrial Design Engineering, and founded by Amy Smith of MIT, who also co-founded the MIT IDEAS Competition, and Ana Laura Santos, a PhD candidate in the department of Design for Sustainability and Medisign at TU Delft. We are so excited that Jan was able to work with these brilliant individuals!
Omnia has extensive research experience in climate policy, environmental politics, and private governance. She has been involved in numerous projects dealing with environmental issues and sustainability, including launching Eco Options Egypt, the first environmental issues online magazine in Egypt, and acting as an Energy and Environment Program Consultant for the United Nations Industrial Development Organization in Italy (Cairo Office). Omnia serves as Potential Energy’s on-the-ground representative in moving to a financially sustainable market-based strategy for the Berkeley-Darfur Stove in Darfur and other areas of Sudan. Omnia has an MSc in Environmental and Resource Management from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and a BSc in Biology from the American University in Cairo.
Getnet Tesfaye has worked for the Ethiopian Rural Energy Development and Promotion Center for 19 years as an energy planner, energy information officer and as a member of several sector strategy and policy development teams. His recent clean cooking related experience includes project development and coordination for the Nordic Climate Fund-supported project for clean cooking promotion in Ethiopia, and the development and implementation of the EU Energy Facility-funded Integrated Rural Household Energy project being implemented by Addis Ababa University. Getnet holds an MS in Energy Systems and the Environment from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the Addis Ababa University.
Hilawe Lakew has many years of experience in energy engineering related to industrial, household, and rural energy programs, with particular emphasis on energy efficiency and the harnessing and utilization of alternative energy resources such as biomass, solar and micro hydro. Hilawe has been part of several clean cooking stove design and dissemination projects in Ethiopia, including the design and development of an improved charcoal stove and the development of the improved injera baking stove as a design expert at the Ethiopian Ministry of Mines and Energy. Hilawe obtained an MSc. in Renewable Energy and The Environment from The University of Reading, UK and a BS in Physics from Addis Ababa University.
