Renewable energy: Powering rural development in South Asia

Dr. Boidurjo Rick Mukhopadhyay

International Award-Winning Development and Management Economist. He can be reached at boidurjo@gmail.com

Prof Bibhas K Mukhopadhyay

Professor of Management, and author of the book 'India's Economy: Under a Tinsel still Tough'.

He can be reached at m.bibhas@gmail.com

The Renewable Energy Association defines "Renewable energy technologies are energy providing technologies that utilize energy services in ways that do not deplete the Earth's natural resources and are as environmentally benign as possible. These sources are sustainable in that they can be managed to ensure they can be used indefinitely without degrading the environment". These technologies favour power system decentralization and locally applicable solutions more or less independent of the national network, thus enhancing the flexibility of the system and the economic power supply to small isolated settlements. Several research showcases that renewable energy technologies, energy conservation, cogeneration and district heating, energy storage technologies, alternative energy dimensions for transport, energy source switching from fossil fuels to environmentally benign energy forms, coal cleaning technologies, optimum monitoring and evaluation of energy indicators, policy integration, recycling, process change and sectoral shifts, acceleration of forestation, carbon or fuel taxes, materials substitution, promoting public transport are broadly the solutions for the environmental challenges that developing nations are threatened with at large.

From a small base in the 1970s, the 'new' renewable i.e. biomass, geothermal, PV, small-scale hydro, solar thermal electric and wind, have grown proportionally more rapidly than any other electricity supply technology. The International Energy Agency had projected that, without policy initiatives, fossil fuels will account for more than 90 of total primary energy demand in 2020. Major international studies indicate significant growth- potential for renewables, particularly in scenarios where environmental constraints are imposed, for example on C02 emissions.

India, Brazil, and China have the highest levels of use of renewable combustibles - higher than the developed countries, while Russia has the lowest level. India has the highest level of use of combustible renewables and waste in total energy, despite experiencing a major decrease in these levels overtime. In the 1990s, around 40% of total energy use in India was renewable combustible; in the 2000s this ratio decreased to 30%. This high share seems due to India's reliance on non-commercial energy sources in rural areas, including wood, crop residues and animal waste, whereas the decrease in the use of renewable combustibles would seem attributable to the replacement of traditional sources by more efficient commercial energy sources.

Similarly, in the 1990s, 30% and 20% of the energy used in Brazil and China, respectively, was renewable combustible; in the 2000s it was about 25% in Brazil and 13% in China. The decrease in the use of renewable combustibles in India, China and Brazil may indicate that economic development initially leads to reduced use of traditional renewables and increased use of fossil fuels, rather than an increase in the use of modern renewables. In Russia and South Africa, on the other hand, the levels of renewable combustibles in total energy consumption were stable and significantly lower during the same period, by about 1% and 10%, respectively.

Bangladesh's experience with solar RETs and dissemination of the same to poor rural household and building entrepreneurs has been highly successful, making it the first 'solar nation' in the world. Penetration of RETs in the form of Solar Home Systems (SHS) in rural households and the use of the technology for creating micro enterprises has been widely cited as a successful case of solar RE contributing to communities and wider society. Households who received the SHS used the technology to start micro enterprises from home by making and selling different home-made handicraft goods e.g., jute and silk products. In many communities, these micro enterprises also hired other people from the local community. The myth that solar energy was not affordable has been broken, over one million SHS have been installed in Bangladesh, benefitting over 6 million rural people. This has encouraged local entrepreneurship, especially women-led start-ups that counts for 36% of the same, rural women are assembling solar accessories in village-based technology centres, solar engineers are increasingly employed in designing SHS, working in battery factories, and other accessory related businesses.

The case of Bangladesh is very similar to SELCO's initiatives in India. SELCO India Pvt Limited (based out of Karnataka) identified that mobilization of finance, realization of niche markets for RETs and strengthening relevant institutions to introduce solar RETs in rural areas are possible avenues to empower women, the disadvantaged, create jobs and facilitate rural development. Apart from the above initiatives, Grameen Shakti and Bright Green Energy Foundation in Bangladesh have been exceptionally successful in reaching out to the poor and building local level women entrepreneurs over time. In India, the importance of women (i.e. the primary users of household energy for cooking and heating) in the context of energy have been widely recognised by successful organizations and networks like SEWA (Self Employed Women's Association), TIDE (Technology Informatics Design Endeavour), AIWC (All India Women's Association) & SELCO (Solar Electric light company of India). The aim is to involve more women and transform them into energy entrepreneurs.

For example, the Gramin Bank offers small credit to women entrepreneurs in rural Bangladesh; these women are already marketing PV systems and operate cell phone through solar energy. All India Women's Conference (AIWC) in India started providing rural women with solar lanterns and charging stations. Women charge their lanterns during daytime and then in the evening they rent the solar lanterns to street vendors and to those houses that do not have electricity or face long hours of power cut. AIWC has also initiatives on solar powered water purifier (women sell purified potable water to the locality at very nominal rates). Two other household level income generating activities started by women by solar RETs are bare foot engineers from TILLONIA Women's group not only install, maintain and repair but also manufacture parabolic solar cookers with confidence. Also, at BAHAI's women's group from Madhya Pradesh women are manufacturing, selling and also marketing solar cookers.

Innovative credit system, appropriate product design, grassroots based effective and efficient after sales service plus other consumer friendly options play a big role in above mentioned cases. One of the main factors behind the Bangladesh success story is that it empowers rural communities to own and use solar RETs and eventually become partners to bring and expand solar RETs in their communities. These organizations, besides providing the necessary technologies, also offer credit and market opportunities to their target users and clients.

Another endeavour made by AIWC and CRT (Centre for Rural Technologies) in Nepal where the solar RETs provided to women comes in the form of solar air-dryers which involves zero energy cost while processing fruits and condiments in clean and hygienic environment. Also, Nepal Government's MHP (Micro-hydropower) scheme has emerged as one of the promising decentralized renewable technology and proved to be one of the most successful models among several other RETs in Nepal. Both the government and private sectors cooperates and partners in promotion of the MHP sector. In addition, the Agriculture Development Bank of Nepal (ADB/N) plays intermediary role between government and private entrepreneurs for providing financial help (loan) in installing MHP plants in Nepal. This has spurred local entrepreneurs and solar RET based initiatives and have boosted local opportunities, it is apparent that having access to a reliable and affordable supply of electricity, rural households can create jobs at community level, which ultimately accelerate rural economic development.

Rural eco-entrepreneurship development (REED) programme for employment generation in environmental services is another initiative which promotes those enterprises with the focus in renewable energy (RE) and to assist and facilitate setting up of environment service enterprises that provide services to people in renewable energy and bio-waste processing and helping them in running sustainably. REED programme focuses on facilitating rural youth, women, SHGs and micro enterprises to set up new ventures in the fields of waste-to-fertilizer projects, renewable energy and maintenance and equipment supply enterprises. The 'packaging' of a rural energy-based programmes is particularly important, from the above examples a combination of various components such as capacity building, technology transfer, training, financing, costing can be learned.