The world was captivated in the 1980’s as horrific images of starvation in Ethiopia filled flooded TV screens and periodicals. Sadly, this problem was nothing new.

The decades-old problem of stymied development in Africa caught the world’s attention in the 1980’s as horrific images of starvation in Ethiopia filled TV screens and periodicals.  Stories of food aid rotting on the docks due to lack of transportation problems got petroleum engineer Ben Ebenhack thinking about how access to modern energy could facilitate famine relief efforts and development in general. Through his work in assessing energy supplies worldwide, Ben knew that energy resources existed throughout the developing world – and also why they were being overlooked by national and multinational energy companies

Ben was convinced that energy could be produced using local resources for the benefit of local people, and began exploring how he could mount an effort to do so., recognizing that he would need enabling partners with expertise beyond his own.

In 1986, the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African American Studies was being formed at the University of Rochester. Dr. Karen E. Fields, the Founding Director, brought with her a desire to include innovative projects with the potential for real application in Africa. In 1987, she invited Ben to work with the Institute’s social scientists to evaluate the potential for localized energy projects.

As the initiative moved toward defining how operations in Africa would be carried out, the University of Rochester advised that a separate entity be incorporated to manage the venture: one that was housed on campus and able to benefit from the expertise within academia, but having its own mission and goals.  With the help of the University of Rochester, the AHEAD Energy Corporation was chartered in 1988 as a public charity.

AHEAD’s approach to developing energy services in Africa evolved over time as information was gathered about economic realities, cultural preferences, and environmental constraints surrounding the pressing need for Africans to access alternatives to firewood.  University of Rochester students who enrolled in Institute classes and served as AHEAD interns played an important role in this progression.

Our initial focus, developing Africa's natural gas resources, has evolved into optimizing "energy mixes", i.e. hybridizing multiple technologies to meet a variety of energy needs.  When possible, installed systems have the capacity to transition toward future technologies with increasingly smaller negative impacts on the environment. Thus, AHEAD began collecting information on a broad range of energy resources, technologies, distribution systems and business approaches.  Of particular concern was the development of appropriately scaled projects – large enough to bring about systemic change but small enough for locals to operate.

A grant received from the proceeds of the 1985 Live Aid concert enabled Ben Ebenhack and Karen Fields to make a trip to Mozambique in 1991. There, they discovered an effort to provide electricity to the town of Vilankulos, population 60,000, that was stalled by project developers' inability to afford the installation of standard gas transmission infrastructure.  Natural gas from a proven field needed to be transported 100 kilometers and linked to an existing electric grid. AHEAD provided information on an alternative gas pipeline technology which was adopted and resulted in the project’s completion.  Not only was the Town of Vilankulos electrified, but services were subsequently extended to neighboring towns and even to an offshore island.

To read more about the history of AHEAD Energy, please download our brochure.