SANEA supports youth development by hosting events to encourage participation by young professionals in the energy field.  Young South Africans have represented the country at WEC Congresses since 1995 when the 16^th WEC Congress was held in Tokyo, Japan.

In addition SANEA is also attempting to increase the energy awareness of high schools by running periodic competitions and has had a manual developed to illustrate energy principles to children of disadvantaged (typically rural) schools.  A secondary aim is to alert learners to potential career opportunities in the energy industry at a stage where they are making decisions regarding their future careers.

The purpose of the WEC Rural Energy Project is to identify the route for sustainable development of rural energy in developing countries.  It works in conjunction with other rural energy projects such as SEED (Sustainable Energy, Environment and Development Programme).  South Africa is very active in this committee.

This project is progressing and will be an integral part of the WEC Global Energy Information System (GEIS), which is functional.  The aims of the system are to assist investors, planners, managers and politicians to have access to timely and correct information on investments, expansion planning and policy-making in Africa.  The AEIS will form an important functional component of the AFREC information system and WEC is working closely with AFREC on this process.

This committee has been in existence for many years.  Eskom staff (through Eskom's membership of SANEA) have a significant profile on this committee.  The dramatic improvement in the performance of Eskom power stations was triggered by interaction with this committee.

South Africa – represented by BP – authored one case study.

South Africa – represented by Ingwe Coal – contributed to the 2000 symposium in Dakar.  More recently, South Africa has provided inputs to this study via SANEA member, Anglo Coal.

SANEA's Brian Statham is chair of this flagship study for the 2005 - 2007 WEC study cycle.  This study has involved over 60 of the WEC member committees and more than 400 energy decision makers have contributed to the work.  The methodology of the study is different from  most published scenarios work in that it is based on the opinions of senior people working in the energy sector and is built on a bottom up basis.  The final report will be published at the WEC Congress in Rome, November 2007 and will be followed by regional and national roll-out initiatives.