Mini MBA in Renewable Energy Training Course

Duration 10 days 20 modules · 65 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Energy Managers, Investment and Finance Managers and others
Fee from USD 2,200 KSh 190,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-ETR-015

Before you join: Participants should have basic business literacy and familiarity with their organisation’s energy use, sustainability commitments, infrastructure assets or investment processes.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Renewable energy investment decisions now sit at the intersection of engineering, finance, regulation, procurement and climate commitments. Organisations must decide which technologies to pursue, how to contract supply, how to assess project economics, and how to manage grid, policy, construction and counterparty risks. Managers who understand only one part of the value chain can struggle to challenge assumptions, approve capital, or turn net-zero commitments into bankable programmes.

This Mini MBA in Renewable Energy Training Course develops the commercial and strategic judgement needed to lead renewable energy initiatives. Participants examine solar, wind, storage, bioenergy and green hydrogen business models; electricity-market design; project development; corporate procurement; project finance; power purchase agreements; carbon accounting; ESG reporting; and portfolio strategy. The course connects technical project choices to investment cases, financial returns, operating risks and organisational decarbonisation plans.

Instructor-led sessions combine short briefings with utility, industrial, public-sector and infrastructure cases. Participants interpret generation and price data, build financial and risk assumptions, assess procurement options, review investment proposals, and test decisions through structured group work and simulations. Throughout the programme, each participant develops an energy-transition business case relevant to their organisation, using course templates and decision tools.

The course suits managers working for utilities, banks, infrastructure investors, government bodies, large energy users, developers, manufacturers and NGOs. It is particularly useful for professionals moving into renewable energy roles or taking responsibility for capital allocation, energy procurement, sustainability strategy, project development or climate-related reporting.

What you will be able to do

  • Evaluate renewable energy technologies using resource, grid, cost and maturity criteria
  • Build a discounted cash flow model for a renewable energy project
  • Compare power purchase agreement structures and allocate commercial risks
  • Assess project-development risks through a stage-gate diligence process
  • Develop an organisational renewable energy procurement and decarbonisation plan
  • Apply GHG Protocol Scope 2 accounting to electricity procurement decisions
  • Interpret IFRS S2 climate-disclosure requirements for energy-transition investments
  • Present a complete renewable energy business case with recommendations and controls

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Build confidence reviewing renewable energy investment proposals and developer assumptions
  • Gain practical language for discussions with engineers, lenders, utilities and advisers
  • Produce a credible internal case for renewable procurement or project investment
  • Improve readiness for energy-transition, infrastructure-finance and sustainability leadership roles
  • Apply recognised carbon-accounting and climate-disclosure concepts to management decisions

For your organisation

  • Improve capital-allocation decisions through consistent project economics and risk assessment
  • Reduce energy-cost and emissions exposure through better procurement strategy
  • Strengthen challenge of developer, lender, consultant and supplier proposals
  • Create clearer links between decarbonisation targets, budgets and implementation priorities
  • Improve governance evidence for climate-related investment and disclosure decisions

Course modules

20 modules over 10 days

Participants can explain the economic, policy and commercial forces shaping renewable energy investment decisions.

  • Energy transition drivers: demand growth, electrification, policy, and capital flows
  • Technology learning curves, marginal costs, and merit-order electricity pricing
  • Externalities, carbon pricing, and avoided-emissions investment rationale
  • Energy trilemma trade-offs between affordability, reliability, and decarbonisation
  • Value-chain mapping from resource development through electricity end use
  • Stakeholder incentives affecting renewable investment approvals and operating decisions

Participants can compare renewable technology options against commercial and operational requirements.

  • Solar photovoltaic components, yield factors, degradation, and operating constraints
  • Onshore and offshore wind resource assessment, wake losses, and availability
  • Bioenergy feedstock economics, sustainability criteria, and dispatchable generation roles
  • Hydropower development constraints, reservoir management, and environmental permitting
  • Green hydrogen production pathways, electrolyser economics, and offtake requirements
  • Technology selection matrix using cost, resource, maturity, and grid criteria

Participants can assess how market rules and policy instruments affect renewable project revenues.

  • Wholesale market structures: energy-only, capacity, balancing, and ancillary services
  • Regulated tariffs, competitive auctions, feed-in tariffs, and contracts-for-difference
  • Merchant-price exposure, capture rates, curtailment, and congestion risk
  • Grid codes, interconnection queues, and connection-cost allocation mechanisms
  • Permitting pathways, environmental impact assessment, and land-use approvals
  • Policy-risk assessment using scenario analysis and regulatory change indicators

Participants can formulate a renewable energy strategy linked to organisational objectives and constraints.

  • Strategic ambition translated into generation, procurement, and emissions targets
  • PESTLE and Porter's Five Forces applied to renewable energy markets
  • Portfolio diversification across technologies, locations, counterparties, and contract tenors
  • Build-buy-partner decisions using strategic control and capability criteria
  • Materiality assessment connecting energy exposure, emissions, and stakeholder expectations
  • Strategy map linking objectives, initiatives, accountabilities, and performance measures

Participants can select renewable procurement routes suited to organisational load, risk appetite and targets.

  • Load-profile analysis using interval consumption, peak demand, and seasonal patterns
  • Procurement hierarchy: efficiency, onsite generation, certificates, and contracted supply
  • Physical versus virtual PPAs: settlement mechanics, basis risk, and accounting
  • Renewable energy certificates, additionality claims, and market-boundary considerations
  • Tender evaluation criteria covering price, volume, tenor, and counterparty strength
  • Demand-response opportunities aligned with renewable generation and tariff structures

Participants can evaluate early-stage development evidence and identify critical project viability risks.

  • Solar irradiation datasets, pyranometer measurements, and long-term resource adjustment
  • Wind measurement campaigns, P50 estimates, P90 cases, and uncertainty ranges
  • Site-screening criteria: land rights, topography, access, grid, and constraints
  • Development stage gates from origination through financial close and commissioning
  • Environmental and social impact assessment scopes, baselines, and mitigation measures
  • Development risk register covering permits, land, community, and interconnection

Participants can build and interpret a project-level financial model for renewable generation assets.

  • Project finance structure: sponsors, special-purpose vehicle, lenders, and contractors
  • Revenue build from generation forecasts, tariffs, escalation, and curtailment assumptions
  • Operating cost schedules, reserve accounts, lifecycle replacements, and insurance
  • Discounted cash flow using NPV, IRR, payback, and discounted payback
  • Debt sizing through debt-service coverage ratio and cash-flow available debt service
  • Financial model audit checks for formulas, units, timing, and assumptions

Participants can test renewable investment cases using sensitivity, scenario and risk-adjusted analysis.

  • Weighted average cost of capital and renewable asset discount-rate drivers
  • Sensitivity tables for capital cost, yield, power price, and debt terms
  • Scenario analysis using downside, base-case, upside, and stress assumptions
  • Monte Carlo simulation concepts for correlated generation and price uncertainty
  • Risk-adjusted return metrics: value at risk, NPV-at-risk, and hurdle rates
  • Investment committee papers presenting assumptions, decision options, and recommendations

Participants can assess PPA terms and identify material revenue, credit and performance risks.

  • PPA term sheets: contracted volume, delivery point, tenor, and pricing
  • Fixed-price, indexed-price, floor-and-collar, and contract-for-difference structures
  • Risk allocation for curtailment, change-in-law, force majeure, and imbalance
  • Credit support through guarantees, letters of credit, and parent undertakings
  • Settlement calculations for physical delivery, financial hedges, and certificates
  • Contract review checklist for termination rights, remedies, and dispute resolution

Participants can evaluate construction and operating arrangements that protect project value.

  • EPC contract structures, completion tests, liquidated damages, and warranties
  • Construction schedules using critical path method and milestone payment controls
  • Owner's engineer roles, quality assurance, site supervision, and acceptance testing
  • Operations and maintenance contracts, availability guarantees, and performance ratios
  • Asset management dashboards tracking generation, availability, incidents, and revenue
  • Lifecycle planning for repowering, component replacement, decommissioning, and recycling

Participants can assess grid integration and flexibility measures for variable renewable generation.

  • Transmission constraints, distribution hosting capacity, and grid-impact studies
  • Interconnection studies: load flow, fault level, stability, and harmonics
  • Battery storage sizing by power, energy duration, degradation, and cycling
  • Storage revenue stacking across arbitrage, capacity, balancing, and ancillary services
  • Hybrid projects combining solar, wind, batteries, and shared interconnection
  • Curtailment mitigation through forecasting, flexible demand, storage, and transmission

Participants can assess renewable energy options for difficult-to-abate industrial demand.

  • Industrial emissions baseline using fuel consumption, process emissions, and production data
  • Electrification options for heat pumps, electric boilers, and arc furnaces
  • Green hydrogen value chain from electricity supply through transport and use
  • Levelised cost of hydrogen assumptions: utilisation, electricity, capital, and water
  • Offtake agreements, certification schemes, and additionality requirements for hydrogen
  • Abatement-cost curves comparing renewable alternatives against existing fuel systems

Participants can connect renewable energy decisions to defensible emissions accounting and claims.

  • GHG Protocol Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 boundaries
  • Location-based and market-based Scope 2 methods compared with examples
  • Emission-factor selection, residual mixes, certificates, and contractual instruments
  • Additionality, temporal matching, deliverability, and credible renewable energy claims
  • Avoided-emissions calculations distinguished from organisational inventory reporting requirements
  • Carbon-accounting control checklist covering data sources, approvals, and evidence

Participants can prepare decision-relevant climate and finance information for renewable energy initiatives.

  • IFRS S2 governance, strategy, risk management, metrics, and targets
  • Transition-plan elements: baseline, actions, financing, milestones, and accountability
  • Climate scenario analysis for demand, policy, physical risk, and prices
  • EU Taxonomy concepts: substantial contribution, do-no-significant-harm, minimum safeguards
  • Green bond and sustainability-linked loan structures, KPIs, and reporting
  • Disclosure evidence packs linking project data, approvals, controls, and statements

Participants can assess supply-chain, community and workforce issues affecting renewable project delivery.

  • Critical minerals supply chains for solar modules, turbines, batteries, and cables
  • Supplier due diligence covering traceability, labour rights, and environmental performance
  • Community engagement plans mapping interests, grievances, benefits, and consultation
  • Free, prior, and informed consent principles for affected Indigenous peoples
  • Local-content requirements, workforce development, and economic-benefit commitments
  • Just-transition assessment of employment impacts, affordability, and regional development

Participants can conduct structured commercial diligence for renewable projects and operating assets.

  • Diligence workplan covering market, technical, legal, financial, and ESG streams
  • Data-room review priorities for permits, contracts, models, studies, and claims
  • Red-flag analysis distinguishing remediable issues from investment deal-breakers
  • Counterparty assessment using credit metrics, delivery record, and concentration exposure
  • Independent engineer reports: scope, key findings, qualifications, and reliance
  • Diligence report structure with risks, mitigations, valuation impacts, and conditions

Participants can evaluate portfolio growth options and transaction logic for renewable energy assets.

  • Portfolio segmentation by development stage, technology, geography, and revenue model
  • Asset valuation methods: discounted cash flow, comparables, and precedent transactions
  • M&A synergies from platforms, operating scale, procurement, and market access
  • Earn-outs, contingent value rights, and milestone-based development acquisitions
  • Portfolio risk dashboard covering merchant exposure, concentration, liquidity, and maturity
  • Post-acquisition integration plan for governance, systems, contracts, and teams

Participants can establish governance arrangements for accountable renewable energy decision-making.

  • Decision-rights matrix for boards, executives, project teams, and external advisers
  • Stage-gate governance linking evidence requirements to investment approval thresholds
  • RACI matrix for development, procurement, finance, operations, and reporting
  • Risk appetite statements for construction, merchant revenue, credit, and reputation
  • Board reporting packs using milestones, forecast variance, risks, and decisions
  • Leadership communication framing trade-offs, uncertainty, value, and stakeholder concerns

Participants can create an implementation roadmap with accountable actions, milestones and performance measures.

  • Work-breakdown structure translating strategy into projects, workstreams, and deliverables
  • Roadmap sequencing based on dependencies, permits, financing, and grid connections
  • OKRs for renewable deployment, emissions reduction, cost, and reliability
  • KPI definitions for capacity, generation, emissions, savings, and project progress
  • Benefits-realisation plan assigning owners, baselines, measurement, and review cadence
  • Change-management plan addressing skills, operating procedures, incentives, and communications

Participants can build, review and present a complete renewable energy business case with an investment recommendation.

  • Capstone brief defining organisational objective, scope, decision, and stakeholders
  • Technology and procurement option appraisal using documented selection criteria
  • Financial case combining capital costs, operating costs, revenues, and sensitivities
  • Risk register covering development, grid, contract, finance, and delivery exposure
  • Implementation roadmap with governance, milestones, resources, KPIs, and controls
  • Investment committee presentation defending recommendation, assumptions, trade-offs, and next steps

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Renewable energy investment-case template
  2. Project finance cash-flow model
  3. PPA term-sheet review checklist
  4. Renewable procurement decision matrix
  5. Energy-transition risk register
  6. Implementation roadmap and KPI dashboard

Who should attend

  • Energy Managers — need to procure lower-carbon electricity and manage energy-cost exposure
  • Investment and Finance Managers — assess renewable project returns, risks and capital structures
  • Sustainability Managers — convert emissions commitments into credible energy procurement plans
  • Project Development Managers — strengthen commercial, regulatory and financing decisions
  • Public-Sector Energy Officials — evaluate renewable programmes, tenders and policy instruments
  • Corporate Strategy Managers — assess energy-transition opportunities, partnerships and portfolio priorities

Skills and tools covered

Renewable project financeEnergy procurement strategyPPA risk allocationGrid integration planningClimate disclosureInvestment case development

Tools and standards

Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE), Discounted Cash Flow (DCF), GHG Protocol Scope 2 Guidance, IFRS S2

How the course runs

Training methodology

The programme uses short faculty briefings, worked financial examples, sector cases, facilitated group analysis, contract simulations and structured application planning. Cases cover utility-scale generation, corporate renewable procurement, public tenders, industrial decarbonisation and infrastructure investment. Participants work with project data, cash-flow assumptions, risk registers and procurement scenarios rather than abstract theory. Faculty feedback focuses on the quality of assumptions, commercial logic, risk allocation and decision evidence. Individual application planning links each module to a live organisational issue.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have basic business literacy and familiarity with their organisation’s energy use, sustainability commitments, infrastructure assets or investment processes. Experience in finance, engineering, procurement, policy, operations or sustainability is useful. Participants should be comfortable reading simple financial tables and discussing commercial decisions. Prior renewable energy project experience is not required. The course does not require engineering design capability, advanced financial modelling, coding, electricity-market trading experience or prior knowledge of climate-reporting standards. Technical concepts are introduced before they are applied to commercial decisions.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You should understand basic business concepts and have some familiarity with energy, sustainability, operations, finance or infrastructure decisions. You do not need an engineering qualification, advanced spreadsheet modelling ability or previous renewable project experience.

Bring a laptop for financial-model and planning work, together with any non-confidential information about a live energy or decarbonisation issue. Participants may use their own organisational context when developing the capstone business case.

It is designed for managers and specialists who need cross-functional commercial knowledge of renewable energy. Typical participants come from utilities, corporates, banks, government, developers, infrastructure investors and sustainability teams.

The course focuses on business decisions rather than system design calculations. It covers technology sufficiently to assess commercial implications, then concentrates on markets, finance, contracts, risk, procurement, governance and strategy.

Participants can use the investment-case template, procurement matrix, risk register and roadmap on current projects or planned initiatives. The capstone creates a structured case that can be adapted for internal sponsors, investment committees or procurement teams.

Each training day runs from 08:30 to 16:30 and provides about 6.5 contact hours. The first week establishes markets, technologies, procurement and finance; the second week develops risk, reporting, portfolio, governance and implementation work before the capstone presentation.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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