Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy: Local NGO eyeing global award

A Pakistani non-governmental organisation has been selected as one of the finalists for an international green energy award.

The Building and Construction Improvement Programme (BACIP) of the Aga Khan Planning and Building Service (AKPBS) has been selected as one of the finalists for the Ashden Awards 2011.

The finalists will compete for over £120,000 prize money. The winner’s name will be announced at a ceremony in London on June 16, said a press release issued by the AKPBS here on Friday.

“Our dream is a world where access to clean, affordable electricity and fuel can be enjoyed by the poor, transforming living standards, reducing CO2 emissions and easing the pressure on our dwindling forests,” said Sarah Butler-Sloss, Founder Director of the Ashden Awards.

“The 2011 Ashden Award finalists are making this vision a reality, and their potential for expansion and replication is high. It is our sincere hope that others are inspired to enable their growth and follow their lead,”she remarked.

BACIP is providing families in remote mountain villages with access to affordable, energy-efficient technologies which insulate their homes, heat their water and reduce their consumption of fuel wood.

The programme tackles deforestation and climate change by saving 100,000 tons of wood a year and preventing emissions of around 160,000 tons of CO2 a year.

AKPBS aims to extend this approach to other Himalayan countries, which face similar challenges and reach another 17,000 homes by 2014, the release said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 21^st, 2011.