Clean Cooling Pillars

The Key Pillars of Clean Cooling

1. Training and capacity building

  • Training for farmers and co-operatives
  • Training for community mobilisers
  • Training for cold-chain engineers
  • Training for policymakers and financial institutes
  • Development of the SPOKEs network and CoE programme in India
  • Cold-chains through the GESI lens
  • Undergraduate and postgraduate degrees

Visit our Academy to view all training and professional development opportunities: Clean Cooling  Academy

2. Finance and Business Models

  • Financeable Business Models and deployment approaches
  • Inclusive Financing Mechanisms, including blended finance solutions
  • Return on Investment Model (social benefits) to underpin Governments’ investments

Review Business models available to help finance your cold-chain initiatives: Clean Cooling Toolkits

3. System Design and Modelling

  • Peer-reviewed data collection tools
  • Horizon scanning
  • Virtual modelling
  • Telemetrics and data collection
  • Next-generation’ vaccine cold-chain infrastructure and systems
  • Energy Transition and Access (including electrification of transport strategies)
  • Agrifood system testing from soil to fork (SMART FARM plus Cold-chain campus) 

Review models and toolkits to help analyse your cold-chain requirements: Clean Cooling Toolkits

4. Technology - research, testing, demonstration & innovation

  • Climate resilience
  • Build and demonstrate off-grid Community Cooling Hubs
  • Testing new technologies
  • On-farm pre-cooling
  • Off-grid, low GWP, efficient solutions through the cold-chain
  • Off-grid vaccine cold--chain incl. ultra-cold
  • Development of protocols for testing food safety and vaccine efficacy and energy efficiency
  • Support to existing technologies including transition to efficient, low GWP alternatives
  • Demonstrating new technologies (including through the SPOKEs and Try Before You Buy (TBYB)
  • In-country assembly (Phase 2) to complement training activities and build capacity, improving accessibility and availability of alternative technologies.
  • Lifecycle management
  • Demonstration and sales channels for innovators

5. Future-proofed sustainable vaccine cold-chains

In addition to integration across the above pillars, specific work for Vaccines includes:

  • Mitigate need for cold-chain (vehicles and Point of Care storage) by combining Point of Care Lateral Flow Test with Aerial Unmanned Vehicle (UAV i.e Drone) delivery (including for refugee camps)
  • Develop vaccine cold-chain network analysis tools for efficiency re-design needed for the challenges of mRNA vaccines and climate change,
  • Use digital twins for stress testing threats and solutions

6. Enabling policies and thought leadership

  • Promotion and adoption of a holistic, systems-based approach
  • Risk radar and cold-chain security index
  • Public, private community partnership financing
  • Cooling as critical infrastructure
  • Expansion of the Global Vision through a reference approach
  • New strategies for energy savings and energy efficiency e.g. increasing set point for frozen food by three degrees
  • GESI - The programme is underpinned by a cross-cutting Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI)  workstream to include a comprehensive framework, tools, training, monitoring and evaluation.

Network News

The latest from the global Clean Cooling community

The ACES team visit the Ntarama Genocide Memorial

On April 9th, 2025, the team from the Africa Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Cooling and Cold-chain (ACES) visited the Ntarama Genocide Memorial to honour the memory of the victims of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. In this place of remembra

CCN and ACES announce the Festival of Cooling for September 2025

The Clean Cooling Network and the Africa Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Cooling and Cold-chain (ACES) are hosting a week-long, public engagement “Festival of Cooling” (Sept 22nd – 26th) at the ACES Campus in Kigali, Rwanda, and via an outreach programme.

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Events & Webinars

Exclusive lectures and workshops from the Clean Cooling team and partners.

Festival of Cooling

The Clean Cooling Network and the Africa Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Cooling and Cold-chain (ACES) are hosting a week-long, public engagement “Festival of Cooling” at the ACES Campus in Kigali, Rwanda, and via an outreach programme.

See All Events