Technology and engineering consultants for facilities, plant and power.

We work across two connected domains. On the engineering side: HVAC and building services, cold storage and cold chain, agro-processing and industrial plant, and building mechanical and electrical systems. On the energy side: power generation and renewables, grid connection and energy access, industrial energy and efficiency, and emerging areas such as EV charging and storage.

Across both we apply the same six capabilities: strategy and advisory, assessment and technical studies, design and engineering, procurement and construction supervision, transaction and finance, and assurance and compliance. Most clients engage us across both, because cooling, refrigeration and processing plant are what drives the energy bill in the first place.

Approximately thirty minutes, without charge or obligation. We ask about the site, recent bills and the reason for the enquiry, and give an honest assessment of whether meaningful savings are likely and what establishing them would involve.

Wherever the brief suits us. Cold chain, processing plant, building services and energy carry across borders with very little change, so distance is a question of logistics and cost rather than capability.

Travel and accommodation are quoted transparently within the fixed fee rather than added afterwards, and for a remote site we will say at the outset what the travel component costs and whether it is worth it. Tell us where the site is and we will tell you honestly whether we are the right people for it.

No. We design and specify, then help you tender the work so contractors bid against a defined technical standard, and we supervise the installation if you want us to.

We supply no plant or equipment and take no commission from any contractor or manufacturer. That separation removes any incentive for us to oversize a system or steer you toward a particular supplier.

Yes. Training is one of our seven service lines, and it is often the cheapest way to protect an investment that has already been made. We cover refrigeration and cold chain handling, HVAC operation and maintenance, energy management, solar and backup system operation, post-harvest handling and electrical safety.

Where we can, we train on your own plant rather than in a classroom, because operators retain far more when the equipment is the one they use daily. Courses can be run on site, at your premises as in-house sessions, or as short open courses, and we provide operator and maintenance manuals, assessment and certificates of completion.

The build cost is driven by volume, the temperature you need to hold, and the quality of the insulation and envelope. The running cost is driven almost entirely by three things people underestimate: how well the envelope is sealed, how often doors are opened, and how much warm product is loaded at once. A cheap panel specification is the most common false economy we see, because it is paid for every month afterwards in electricity.

We size the plant against your actual product, throughput and ambient conditions, then specify it so you can tender competitively. That usually costs less than accepting a single supplier's package, and it produces a room that holds temperature.

It can, but rarely as a straight swap. Refrigeration runs at night as well as during the day, so solar alone leaves a gap that has to be covered by batteries or the grid. The approach that works is to reduce the load first through insulation, door management and correct plant sizing, then design a hybrid system around the smaller load.

Done in that order, solar-hybrid refrigeration is often viable, particularly on sites currently running generators. Done in the wrong order, you pay for a much larger solar array than you needed.

Usually by shortening the time between harvest and cooling, rather than by building a larger cold store. Losses are mostly determined in the first hours after harvest, so pre-cooling near the field, shaded collection points and correct handling often recover more produce per shilling than additional cold volume.

Where cold storage is the answer, the specification matters: the wrong temperature or humidity for a given crop can damage it as surely as no cooling at all.

Most commercial buildings in hot climates are cooling heat that should never have entered the building. Glazing, orientation, roof insulation and ventilation typically matter more than the air conditioning plant itself, and addressing them reduces the size of system you need.

Beyond that, oversized or badly controlled units are common: equipment that cycles constantly, runs in empty rooms, or fights against the ventilation. A survey establishes which of these apply before anything is replaced.

Yes. That means the process layout and throughput, the mechanical plant, steam and compressed air, power and standby supply, water and effluent, and the cold chain where the product requires it. Designing these together is the point: processing lines specified in isolation from their utilities are where most capacity shortfalls and cost overruns originate.

We also prepare the tender documents so the build can be competitively priced, and supervise construction if you want us to.

Both. We are frequently engaged as owner's engineer: running the tender, evaluating bids, inspecting installation, and commissioning the plant to confirm it performs as specified before final payment is released.

Because we supply no equipment and take no commission from any contractor, we have no interest in signing off work that is not right.

There is no single figure, because cost is driven by how much energy you actually use and whether you need batteries. The three variables that matter are the size of the array in kilowatts, whether storage is included, and the quality of the equipment. Battery storage typically accounts for a large share of the cost, which is why sizing it against measured consumption rather than an estimate makes a substantial difference to the price.

We establish the figure for your site by measuring your load first, then specifying a system and putting it out to tender. Clients frequently find that competitive tendering against a proper specification costs less than accepting a single installer's quotation.

For most sites with daytime operations and a meaningful electricity or diesel bill, yes. In equatorial and tropical latitudes solar irradiation is strong and consistent year round, so generation is predictable. The economics are strongest where a business currently runs generators, because displacing diesel saves more per unit than displacing grid power.

The honest answer for any particular site depends on your load profile: a business that consumes most of its power at night without storage will see a weaker return. An audit establishes this before you spend anything.

Usually faster and more cheaply than people expect. A number of measures cost nothing to implement: correcting your tariff category, shifting heavy loads away from peak periods, addressing power factor penalties, and eliminating equipment that runs unnecessarily. These can affect your next bill.

Beyond that, efficient motors, lighting, refrigeration and thermal recovery generally repay their cost well before solar does. We recommend establishing these savings first, because a smaller load means a smaller and cheaper solar system if you later install one.

In many cases yes, particularly where a farm currently runs a petrol or diesel pump, or has no grid connection at all. A solar pump has no fuel cost and few moving parts, so operating costs after installation are minimal.

Suitability depends on the water source, the pumping head, and how much water is needed each day. A pump sized for a borehole that cannot sustain the extraction rate will disappoint regardless of the panels.

In many markets electric cooking on an efficient appliance now costs less per meal than charcoal, particularly where the grid has spare capacity and a low generation cost. Energy-efficient electric pressure cookers are typically the cheapest option for foods that take a long time to prepare, such as beans.

The comparison depends on your tariff band and what you cook. For institutions cooking at scale the savings against charcoal are often substantial, and we can model the figure against your actual consumption.

It depends on the size and complexity of the site or project, so we quote a fixed fee after the initial consultation rather than publish a figure that would not apply to you. If we do not expect the savings identified to exceed our fee comfortably, we will tell you before you commit.

Yes. A substantial part of our work is feasibility studies, financial models and finance applications for solar, mini-grid and pay-as-you-go developers preparing projects for lenders or results-based finance facilities.

Yes. We prepare the financial case and documentation that grant programmes, results-based finance facilities and lenders require, and remain engaged through appraisal to financial close. We can also advise on which facilities a project is realistically eligible for before you invest time in an application.

Yes. Cooking, solar and mini-grid programmes can earn carbon revenue, but only where measurement holds up to independent scrutiny. We structure projects against recognised methodologies and build the monitoring that supports issuance and verification.

Yes. We assess networks the way an owner needs them assessed: where the losses actually are, how reliable supply is at each point, whether the conductor and transformers are sized for present and projected load, and what it would cost to fix the worst of it.

That covers load flow and reliability studies, technical and commercial loss analysis, condition assessment, connection and densification planning, and substation and corridor studies. For utilities and programmes we also prepare the investment case that follows from the findings.

Yes. Alongside site-level work we research questions about the sector itself: market sizing and demand, end-use and baseline surveys, resource assessment, tariff and policy analysis, and technology comparison for a specific market or context.

This work is usually commissioned by funders, government and developers deciding where to put money. We collect primary data where it does not already exist rather than recycling assumptions, and we say plainly where the evidence is thin.