Obituary: Dr Douglas Banks
Cape Town, 18.07.2008 - written by: James Smith
We at REEEP have been greatly saddened by news of the death of Doug Banks, one of the leading figures in the rural energy sector in Southern Africa and coordinator of one of REEEP’s current projects. Doug was the Managing Director of Restio Energy Ltd, an energy consultancy based in Cape Town.
The REEEP-funded project on which Doug was working was ‘Developing an integrated rural energy utility roadmap’. The purpose of the project is to build a case for, and facilitate the implementation of rural integrated energy service utilities (IEU), supplying grid, off-grid and thermal energy needs in rural communities both efficiently and sustainably. Operating in South Africa, Uganda and Tanzania, the project will enable a proper review and rigorous analysis of the Integrated Energy Utility concept as applied to rural regions, facilitating replication of the concept in other countries and regions if it proves to work well. We look forward to continuing this work with Doug’s colleagues.
Binu Parthan, REEEP’s Deputy Director, who is responsible for the funding programme, said,
“It's not just Restio and South Africa but the sustainable energy community globally that has lost a brilliant and visionary energy expert. This is indeed very sad and untimely.”
Doug had attended REEEP's Global Project Coordinators meeting in Delhi earlier in the year. He was an excellent person to have in the group sessions: engaged, challenging, keen to share his knowledge with others and to help them. His quiet and enthusiastic energy will be sorely missed.
Doug was a mechanical engineer, gaining a first class honours degree from the University of Cape Town in 1986 and a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand in 1994. He was involved in the rural energy and development sector for over 16 years. In that time he participated in or led a range of consulting and turnkey projects aimed at delivering rural energy solutions. His expertise included technical specifications development, public-private partnerships for rural energy utilities, financial modeling of PV dissemination strategies (including provision for maintenance), grid and off-grid electrification criteria and GIS based electrification modelling. He also worked on broader rural energy use and policy areas (energy audits, fuel wood supply modeling, policy recommendations, socio-economic assessments).
Doug played a key role in setting up the Nuon-RAPS Utility currently operating in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The concession provides an off-grid electricity service (using PV as its core product) in remote rural regions. He participated actively in stakeholder discussions around the PPP structures used, developed the financial model, was the ‘Technical Manager’, managing procurement (tenders, adjudication, procurement for 7500 SHS), developed many of the initial maintenance and operational management procedures for utility staff, and managed the development of a revenue and energy services management system. Other key assignments included: participation in the development of an off-grid (PV based) plan for the Namibian utility Nampower, managing the South African component of a DfID funded project on energy services to rural institutions, technical assistance to Madagascar for school and clinic electrification, participation in mini-grid feasibility and pre-feasibility studies.
Doug undertook national and regional renewable energy resource assessments, and prepared scenarios for renewable energy contributions in South Africa (to 2050) and for the Western Cape (to 2035). He had evaluated a number of UNDP/GEF projects on renewable energy (Uganda, Tanzania and Malawi), and one on climate change enabling activities (Botswana). He wrote a chapter on PV business and delivery models for a UNDP/GEF ‘lessons learned’ publication.
On Friday the 4th July, 2008, Doug passed away after a short but spirited fight against liver cancer. He is survived by his wife Helene and three children, Rowan, Julian and Vivian. Our thoughts are with them.
A bursary/scholarship fund has been established in Doug's honour to encourage young Southern Africans to embark on careers in more sustainable energy services. Find out more on the Restio website.