Partners: PTB – Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt
Country: Senegal
Date: March – May 2026

Senegal is rapidly expanding renewable energies as part of its Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP), including a commitment to reach 40% renewable capacity by 2030. This dynamic transformation creates growing demands for the safety, quality and sustainability of photovoltaic (PV) systems, battery energy storage systems (BESS) and an emerging green hydrogen sector.

To respond to these evolving needs, Senegal requires reliable services for testing, certification, calibration, standardization and market surveillance. A robust quality infrastructure (QI) system is therefore a key enabler of a just and sustainable energy transition.

Our assignment

PTB (Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt) commissioned Ferdinand Consultants to lead the preparation of a short proposal for the next phase of the ongoing project “Strengthening the Quality Infrastructure for Innovative Energy Services II in Senegal”, financed by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Our approach

Ferdinand Consultants supported PTB throughout the full short-proposal process – from analysis to the formulation of concrete project options for BMZ consideration. Our work included:

  • Background analysis of Senegal’s renewable energy sector, early developments in BESS and green hydrogen, and the country’s digitalisation context, including a mapping of the existing international cooperation landscape and JETP governance.
  • Assessment of the national QI system as it relates to energy transition technologies, identifying priority areas where QI services, regulation and coordination need further development to keep pace with sector dynamics.
  • Lessons-learned analysis from the ongoing PTB project, highlighting four aspects that are critical for the next phase: the importance of regulation and enforcement, the gap between policy design and operational implementation, the central role of networking between QI organisations and sector stakeholders, and the need to build QI awareness in emerging fields such as BESS and green hydrogen.
  • Design of two project options

 

Both options are oriented towards the same goal: contributing to Senegal’s energy transition by improving the availability and utilisation of quality infrastructure services required for the safety, quality and sustainability of PV systems, battery storage systems and the emerging green hydrogen sector.

Innovative design and sustainable impact contribution

A central innovation of our assignment was the way in which new thematic priorities were integrated into the existing project logic so that the next phase can generate tangible, sustainability-oriented results. The proposed next phase:

  • Expands the thematic scope beyond PV to explicitly include BESS, green hydrogen and the circularity of PV modules and batteries. In doing so, the project design brings issues such as resource efficiency, safe operation and end-of-life management of equipment into the core of QI support for Senegal’s energy transition.
  • Includes a clear system perspective on quality infrastructure as a whole. It recognises that QI must be developed in a systemic manner. By anchoring renewable energy-related services in this broader system context, the next phase is better positioned to contribute to long-term socio-economic benefits.
  • Builds on and consolidates previous achievements, ensuring that successful elements of the current PTB project – such as support for regulatory frameworks and partner capacities – are not only continued but strategically linked to the new topics. This strengthens the potential for long-term improvements in the safety, reliability and environmental performance of energy technologies.
  • Adopts an outcome-oriented design, with indicators that do not only measure the availability of QI services, but also their utilisation by energy-sector actors. This allows future project phases to demonstrate more clearly how QI services contribute to safer installations, better-performing systems and improved management of energy-related waste streams, without relying solely on input or output metrics.
  • Strengthens coordination with other initiatives, explicitly positioning the project within Senegal’s wider energy transition and investment landscape – including programmes implemented by GIZ, KfW and the JETP framework. This helps ensure that QI-related activities support the broader decarbonisation, social and environmental objectives pursued by Senegal and its partners.

Result

By integrating new topics such as BESS, green hydrogen and circularity into a coherent, outcome-oriented project logic, our work strengthens the ability of the next phase to achieve sustainable impacts: improving the safety and quality of energy systems, supporting more efficient use of resources and preparing Senegal’s QI system for the long-term challenges of a fast-moving energy transition.

“Thank you for your strong commitment, professionalism, and competence. I will always recommend you.”
Jean Bosco Mbom
Project Coordinator
Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB)