Solar energy to illumine 400 villages

By Shahid Husain

MITHI: The country's 400 villages, 300 of them in Balochistan and 100 in Sindh, would be electrified through solar energy, Brigadier Dr Naseem A Khan, Secretary, Alternative Energy Development Board and Member (Technical), government of Pakistan, told The News.

"The PC-1 for electrification through solar energy has been approved and an amount of Rs 450 million allocated for the project," he said. He said the Adviser to the Prime Minister, Dr Mohammad Ali, held a meeting with the district Nazim Arbab Anwer recently and tenders for illuminating Pakistani villages through solar energy were being evaluated.

He said the Asian Development Bank has defended the project on solar energy in the Planning Commission of Pakistan but the funding is being done by the government of Pakistan. "We hope to involve the private sector in a big way," he added.

The Alternative Energy Development Board in collaboration with the Thardeep Rural Development Programme (TRDP), a non-profit, non-governmental organisation of Tharparkar, has illuminated 109 houses of village Bharmal in Tharparkar though solar energy. The village has a population of 780 people.

"Every house in the village has been electrified through solar energy," Mohammad Yaseen, an engineer working for the Alternate Energy Development Board told The News in village Bharmal. "Every house can now enjoy the facility of four bulbs, one fan besides a solar cooker," he said. "The solar cooker works only during the day, directly through the radiation of the sun," he added.

"Children of the village can now study during the night and women can do their embroidery work," he said. "The village was short of fuel wood due to drought and was spending Rs 600-800 per month on oil for a home," he added. He said after the village has been provided solar energy, every family was contributing Rs 100 per month for the maintenance of the project.

"The criteria to choose a village for electrification through solar energy are that it should be 20 kilometres away from the grid and we are collaborating with TRDP that provided us a list of villages in Thar which need solar energy," he said.

Gopinath S
Chief Executive
nRG Consulting Services
Bangalore, India
Ph: 9180 26698211
Mob: 91 98455 11648
Website: http://business.vsnl.com/gopinath
Weblog: http://nrgcs.blogspot.com

 

 

A sincere gesture can be enough to do a great job

Amanur Aman, Back From Daulatpur

It was beyond the dream of poor people on an isolated shoal on the Padma.

Only five months ago, they used to take meal and finish all evening chores under flickering kerosene lamps. And life stopped there for the rest of the night.

Now, the whole village with over 3000 people remains lively till late night. Electricity from a biogas plant has changed their life. Unlike city dwellers they are free from the curse of loadshedding.

Use of biogas plant is not new in the country. But power generation from such a plant and its use by so many households is certainly something great for the downtrodden.

It has been possible due to the effort of a man of the village-- Mohamad Ali--an expatriate in Saudi Arabia. The benevolent man has spent his life's savings of Tk 25 lakh to remove darkness from his village, the beneficiaries said.

The story is of a village named 'Padmar Char' in Ramkrishnapur union in Daulatpur upazila. This union is detached from the upazila headquarters by Padma river, which flows around it.

Ramkrishnapur was once part of the mainland. Thirteen years back, the mighty Padma changed its course causing erosion across the upazila, isolating 18 villages in the union from the upazila headquarters. Since then, these villages were deprived of all facilities from the upazila headquarters and people there have to walk about 6 kilometers and cross the Padma to come to Daulatpur upazila headquarters.

Mohamad Ali went to Saudi Arabia to seek fortune 16 years ago, where he works as an electrician. When he came back to his village, he often thought to 'do something' for the deprived people.

In August last year, Ali came to the village on a five-month leave.

Based on his experience, Ali thought of producing power from biogas for his people. He contacted officials of Bangladesh Biogas Diploma Engineer's Association (BBDA) and its Kushtia unit secretary Safiqul Islam.

He also visited a Biogas plant in Bogra used for domestic purpose.

Ali with Saiful's, help drew a plan for biogas plant to generate power.

He first set up a dairy farm with 150 cows to collect dung and constructed a big a big 'digester tank' with 'inlet' and 'outlet' faces.

Cow dung is poured into 'digester tank' through the 'inlet face', where gas is produced.

A biogas tank has been built at the 'outlet face' of the 'digester', which can contain 25000 cft biogas. A 1600 cc (cubic power) generator has been set up, which produces power by using the biogas through a pipeline.

At least 50 kilowatt electricity is being generated there, which is supplied to the households. Primary schools, mosques and markets in five villages in Ramkrishnapur union now also get electricity from the plant.

The villagers pay Tk 50 for each bulb, which they use at will. But they are very conscious not to misuse the power and take care of the whole system like their own property. About Tk 25,000 is earned from the consumers per month.

Villagers are very happy. As a gratitude to Mohammad Ali they have renamed the area Saudi Ali Para.

Gopinath S
Chief Executive
nRG Consulting Services
Bangalore, India
Ph: 9180 26698211
Mob: 91 98455 11648
Website: http://business.vsnl.com/gopinath
Weblog: http://nrgcs.blogspot.com

 

 

Potential in windmill power generation under-utilised

WINDMILL ENERGY: Sri Lanka is yet to tap the vast wind power generation potential in the country, a member of the visiting Rotary international Club delegation Martin Pedersen said.

In an interview with Daily News he said that Sri Lanka is geographically suited to have more windmills to generate power and the Government must make more investments in this area.

He has already conducted a survey in the Ja Ela area and even this area is suitable to have wind power generated plants.

He said that according to other observations the Hambantota area that already has wind power generated plants can have more plants of this nature.

He said that the biggest advantage of wind power is that unlike thermal or coal power plants there are no environmental concerns. "In addition there is only an initial cost factor involved to generate power and is an ideal source for Sri Lanka," he said.

He said that Danish entrepreneurs are keen to invest in this area and are looking for partners and Government assistance in this regard. Over 20 percent of power generation in Denmark is met from wind power.

'Due to environmental concerns and the fact that fossil energy sources are non-renewable, there is a growing interest in alternative energy sources. One of these sources is wind.

He said that small enterprises in Sri Lanka should consider having their own wind power plant, as it would give them free electricity for life.

"Small scale wind generators have the potential to stimulate village-level charging enterprises for either community or private use," he said.

Wind power can also charge vehicle batteries that provide power to many households, especially rural areas as a power source for lighting.

In Sri Lanka, around 300,000 vehicle batteries are currently in household use, so the potential demand is vast.

Renewable energy has been prioritised in Danish energy policy since the early 1980s. This has led to the current situation where Denmark is one of the leading countries in the world in the field of wind energy utilisation.

Gopinath S
Chief Executive
nRG Consulting Services
Bangalore, India
Ph: 9180 26698211
Mob: 91 98455 11648
Website: http://business.vsnl.com/gopinath
Weblog: http://nrgcs.blogspot.com

 

 

Local villagers back Powergrid project

Local villagers back Powergrid project
Kuldeep Chauhan
Tribune News Service

Banala (Mandi), January 9
Local farmers have pledged their support to the proposed Rs. 560 crore Gas Insulated (GIS) Pooling station to be set by the Powergrid Corporation of India in this village here, but periphery villagers, mainly the banner of Mahila Mandal have raised a banner of revolt against the project, citing hazards of transmission lines and damage to environment as reasons for their opposition.

Banala village in Kingus panchayat, located on the National Highway-21, has been selected out of six other sites - Hansu, Nau Doghri, Gharad, Kotadhar, and Govindpuri - surveyed for the 400/220kv pooling station to store the power generated by the 2051 MW Parbti project, 800 MW Kol Dam, 192 MW Allian Duhangan, 100 MW Malana project. The corporation needs seven acres of land out of which 4.5 acre belongs to Banala farmers and 2.5 acres is the forest land.

Pardhan, Kingus Panchayat, Bhagwandas, who lives in Banala, said that 12 house owners, including he himself, had given their consent for acquiring land for the project which will generate local employment. "The outside villagers are opposing the project as they lost polls last year", he claimed.

Supported by the Snor Valley Bachao Andolan, Banala Mahila Mandal leaders Leela Thakur, Bhawani Devi and Pabana Devi claimed that the project would ruin local ecology as trees would be cut for it. "The gram sabha has not given its NOC. We will lose their TD, firewood and grazing rights in the area", they alleged.

Snor valley Bachao Andolan's Sesh Ram, Gulab Singh and others claimed that pooling station would expose them to the danger of radiation and electrocution as all transmission lines would come here from all directions.

They charged that the Pardahna and supporters of the project were playing in the hands of contractors eyeing "hot money".

Panarsa Forest Ranger Officer Laxmi Chand said that over 643 trees - out of which 500 are smaller-sized chil trees- would be cut for the pooling station in an area of 1054 hectares.

Naib-Tehsildar-Aut- Panarsa-Banala S L Bansal said that notification under section 4 of the Land Acquisition Act was issued on November 28. 2006 after Banala villagers gave their consent for the project.

The Chief Manager Powergrid Corporation G L Prasad said the villagers' fears were unfounded as Powergrid colony in Nalagarh was within the grid.

Gopinath S
Chief Executive
nRG Consulting Services
Bangalore, India
Ph: 9180 26698211
Mob: 91 98455 11648
Website: http://business.vsnl.com/gopinath
Weblog: http://nrgcs.blogspot.com