The Nigerian Institution of Mechanical Engineers says it is bringing together its members across board to brainstorm and come up with alternative energy sources for the nation in order to foster national development.
Prof. Mohammed Ndaliman, National Chairman of the Institution disclosed this at a news conference on Tuesday, in Abuja to announce the 34th International Conference and Annual General Meeting of the Institution.
According to him the theme of the conference is ‘Harmonisation and Optimisation of Nigeria’s Energy Potentials for Sustainable Development.
“This theme will be presented and discussed by various professionals including industrialists, members of the academia, researchers, entrepreneurs policy makers and many others.
“They will make presentations on various issues that bother on energy efficiency, energy resources, security, consumption and utilisation among many other things.
“The Almighty God has created the materials, they are created to be used, so we have to find ways to utilise our alternative energy sources.
” We are leading the bandwagon to see how we will make better use of our abandant natural resources, we have the solar and we will not want to be left behind,” Ndaliman said.
He added that during the conference programmes are also on ground to train and mentor young engineers in hands-on-skills to enhance professional development of the young ones
” We also have programmes for budding engineers these are young graduates and the student. Among their programme we are going to have mentoring workshops.
The Institution has been involved and in mentoring and training of the young engineers only last year we opened a platform for mentoring and internship for the young ones where merging takes place.
“Where those interested in certain areas are merged with the experts for mentoring, those that need internship are also merged various areas for them to conduct their internship,” Ndaliman said.
He said not less than 60 were recently graduated from a workshop where they were trained on different areas of mechanical engineering.
Speaking on the theme of the conference, the immediate past Chairman of the Institution and EU pact Climate Ambassador, Mr Robinson Ejilah said we are at the planet edge of an apocalypse.
“There is a need for us to begin to reappraise our lifestyle. And critically cut down on carbon. Fosil fuels is basically one of the basic problems we have in this world and manufacturing industries, the oil and gas industries, transportation industries are culprits.
“So, it is an engineering challenge that every engineer irrespective of his specialisation should begin to think about bringing about innovations to bypass it.
“And, that is the reason we have to go back to the drawing board and think about how to engage other sources of energy to drive our economy to move around from one part of the world to the other and also run our lives.
The conference will commence on Wednesday, Nov. 17, is a three-day event will have in attendance mechanical engineers from all parts of the country and outside, and other stakeholders.
The Keynote address is expected to be delivered by the Director-General Energy Commission of Nigeria, also there will be technical sessions, panel discussions, Fellowship Conferment to outstanding members and award to members that have contributed to the growth of the sector.
