The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc. (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to our mission of saving lives and reducing the burden of disease in low-and middle-income countries. We work at the invitation of governments to support them and the private sector to create and sustain high-quality health systems.

CHAI was founded in 2002 in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, with the goal of dramatically reducing the price of life-saving drugs and increasing access to these medicines in the countries with the highest burden of the disease. Over the following two decades, CHAI has expanded its focus. Today, along with HIV, we work in conjunction with our partners to prevent and treat infectious diseases such as COVID-19, malaria, tuberculosis, and hepatitis. Our work has also expanded into cancer, diabetes, hypertension, and other non-communicable diseases, and we work to accelerate the rollout of lifesaving vaccines, reduce maternal and child mortality, combat chronic malnutrition, and increase access to assistive technology. We are investing in horizontal approaches to strengthen health systems through programs in human resources for health, digital health, and health financing. With each new and innovative program, our strategy is grounded in maximizing sustainable impact at scale, ensuring that governments lead the solutions, that programs are designed to scale nationally, and learnings are shared globally.

At CHAI, our people are our greatest asset, and none of this work would be possible without their talent, time, dedication and passion for our mission and values. We are a highly diverse team of enthusiastic individuals across 40 countries with a broad range of skillsets and life experiences. CHAI is deeply grounded in the countries we work in, with the majority of our staff based in program countries. Learn more about our exciting work: http://www.clintonhealthaccess.org

CHAI is an Equal Opportunity Employer, and is committed to providing an environment of fairness, and mutual respect where all applicants have access to equal employment opportunities. CHAI values diversity and inclusion, and recognizes that our mission is best advanced by the leadership and contributions of people with diverse experience, backgrounds, and culture.

Program and Position Overview

CHAI is working on a program that aims to enable solar electrification of public institutions at scale. By working with governments to aggregate large numbers of health facilities and schools into portfolios, it will allow for a different type of financing to be deployed to enable solar electrification to the usual project or pilot-based grant financing approach that has traditionally been used. Blended financing structures typically used to support independent power producers and solar project developers might work better to align incentives around system performance, as long as appropriate de-risking instruments are included. Working with portfolios of facilities also allows for bundling of Operations and Maintenance (O&M) service contracts, which can be negotiated to link payments to outcomes (system performance and uptime). Solar power at health facilities and schools could also be used to extend energy access to off-grid communities, and with creative financial structuring, revenues from this can be used to provide affordable energy access to public institutions.

CHAI is seeking an Associate with engineering expertise who will work closely with the Government of Malawi to build and finance a plan that will aim to electrify health facilities and schools in Malawi. The Associate will support the Government of Malawi (including the Ministries of Health, Education, Energy, and Finance) to develop costed and prioritized health facility and school solar electrification plans. The Associate will support a dialogue between the government, donors, banks, and several private sector energy actors (equipment importers, project developers, O&M service providers, and solar engineering, procurement, and construction companies) to build a roadmap towards a transaction that would aim to aggregate existing financing for solar and draw in new financing to electrify as many health facilities and schools in Malawi as possible. The Associate will represent CHAI in relevant Technical Working Groups and taskforces with both donors and government.

This is a challenging, fast-paced and rewarding position that will aim to build new, creative financing solutions to enable solar electrification of public institutions at scale. The Associate will report to the Program Manager, Solar Electrification.

• Work with the Government of Malawi (including the Ministries of Health, Education, Energy, and Finance) to develop and operationalize national health facility and school solar electrification plans, with a focus on providing engineering expertise and technical guidance to inform the plans (including energy needs assessments, the sizing and costing of solar systems, setting of quality standards for solar system procurement, etc.).
• Provide engineering expertise to inform field data collection exercises required to size and cost solar systems at health facilities and schools, including development of data collection SOPs and training of government data collectors.
• Support the Government of Malawi to coordinate donors, partners, and interested financiers in the health and education sectors in Malawi to ensure alignment, technical input, and coordination around the plan.
• Design and implement pilots that seek to answer key research questions that the Government of Malawi may wish to test before moving to national scale-up of health facility and school solar electrification, with a focus on contracting private sector solar firms using an energy-as-a-service approach and estimating revenue that can be generated by productive use energy sales. This will include technical inputs to the preparation of the bill of quantities, defining standards and specifications of the solar systems, conducting routine monitoring and data collection at the pilot sites, and analyzing the data.
• Explore establishment of International Renewable Energy Certificates (I-RECs) in Malawi, including engagement with relevant Ministries (Energy, Natural Resources and Climate Change, Health, Education, and Finance) and development of a roadmap to set up relevant institutions for I-REC registration, issuing, and verification.
• Build relationships with energy service companies in Malawi, to explore opportunities for partnership with the Government of Malawi to enable the project, and to support with building assumptions on costs and pricing for negotiations.
• Support capacity-building of the Government through the process, and build trust between private sector and Government.
• Backstop fundraising and resource mobilization efforts for the team, including through targeted technical and coordination support.
• Contribute to the development of program workplans, budgets, and reporting/documentation for internal and external audiences.
• Lead preparation of activity budgets and ensure timely liquidation of all activities once completed, in line with CHAI and donor best practices and policies for sound financial management.
• Lead activity logistics in collaboration with the CHAI Finance and Operations teams, including disbursing allowances to meeting participants and ensuring that services such as venue hire, conferencing, printing, etc. are available for activities as relevant.
• Perform any other relevant duties and lead day-to-day implementation of activities as assigned.

• Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering or similar relevant subject; diploma or equivalent will be considered with relevant experience.
• Minimum of two years of professional experience for bachelor’s degree holders and five years of experience for diploma holders, preferably in health facility or school solar electrification and including experience installing and managing solar electrification systems in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Strategically minded and able to think creatively about long-term program goals and objectives, and the detailed steps necessary to achieve these goals.
• Strong diplomatic and interpersonal skills and ability to build strategic relationships with government partners, donors, and other stakeholders.
• Demonstrated ability to deliver excellence in high-pressure situations, set priorities, and adapt to rapidly changing environments.
• Excellent organizational and problem-solving skills without need for extensive structural or operational support.
• Strong writer, facilitator, and oral communicator, able to distill and explain complex concepts to varied audiences, including those without an engineering background.

Advantages

• Experience supporting policy decisions and planning by Ministries of Energy, Health, Education, and/or Finance on solar electrification in the health and education sectors.

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