Vocational Training and Education for Clean Energy (VOC TEC)

USAID intends to award a worldwide Leader with Associate (LWA) Cooperative Agreement for the VOCational Training and Education for Clean energy, or VOC TEC. The purpose of this program is to bolster the capacity of local stakeholders to sustain renewable energy investments, primarily in decentralized clean energy technologies and hybrid renewable energy-hydrocarbon systems. The focus of the program will be on distributed energy systems, specifically wind, solar PV, micro-hydro, and hybrid energy systems utilizing any of these three technologies along with fossil-fueled generators. Emphasis will be on developing local capacity to assemble, design, install, operate, and maintain facility-specific or community-level micro-grid systems. The LWA agreement may be with a single institution or with a consortium of institutions. USAID estimates that the USAID/EGAT Energy Team contribution to this agreement will total approximately $3 million dollars over a five-year period from approximately FY2010 to FY2015. USAID anticipates the total ceiling will be $10 million ($3 million to the Leader Award and $7 million towards the Associate Awards).