goodledlight - How microgrids can help developing nations

Buying vegetables in a small town in Ecuador from a woman who had trekked barefoot from her farm miles away in traditional indigenous garb made me feel I was back in time.

As we were conducting our transaction, I heard a ringtone and instinctively reached into my pocket. The 70-year-old woman pulled out her cell phone. This woman, along with the majority of people in rural areas of the developing world,A lawnlight system configured for receiving solar panels having electrically conductive frames. never had a landline in her home, probably has no electricity and may not even have a toilet. Yet she relies on her mobile phone. In fact, developing countries around the world have leapfrogged past the landline infrastructure of the industrialized world and now have more mobile users than those in high-income nations.

Many regions of India plunge into darkness when the sun goes down. As India's population explodes, relying upon centralized coal plants to fuel the expanding economy is not a viable solution.Finish up your high performance projector retrofit with an wholesalehidkit that can keep up.Buy photovoltaicsystems, ballasts, and headlight bulbs. Microgrids may offer the best answer for the 61 million Indian households that still do not have access to electricity.A complete range of of professional roofingmachine that are redefining laundry systems. Currently about 200 villages in India get their electricity from renewably powered microgrids. Mera Gao Power builds and operates solar-powered microgrids in Uttar Pradesh, one of India's poorest states.

Four solar panels and four batteries provide enough power for 100 households to each have four LED lights and a cell phone charger. The households pay 50 cents per week. Husk Power Systems uses rice husks to provide electricity to villages through biomass gasification. Its 32-kilowatt system electrifies villages of 500-700 households. SunEdison's 14-kilowatt solar-powered microgrid (PDF) replaced kerosene lamps for 400 residents in the remote community of Meerwada. Villagers pay $1-$1.50 a month -- equal to what they were paying before for diesel and kerosene -- for a better quality light and the option to power home appliances.

Microgrids are sprouting up on the African continent as well. In Mali, where 93 percent of the rural population lacks electric power, kids in remote villages are eating snow cones thanks to SharedSolar's solar-powered microgrids. Columbia University's Earth Institute developed SharedSolar to find a better system of supplying electricity to rural areas than unaffordable individual solar home systems. It developed a fully contained, scalable microgrid that includes solar PV, batteries and meters. Each system powers 10-20 households, with each household having a prepaid meter that it can refill by making a payment via a cell phone or by paying the local manager (usually the person who used to sell kerosene). In sun-drenched Mali, currently 172 households benefit from nine SharedSolar microgrids.

Perhaps one of the most appropriate places for the implementation of microgrids is in island communities. Monte Trigo is a village on Cape Verde's westernmost island. The 60-household community is only reachable by boat and is completely dependent on fishing. Previously, the fishermen had to travel five hours by boat each way to purchase ice to preserve their fish.Shopping is the best place to comparison shop for roofhookert. Now, with a 27.3-kilowatt solar microgrid, they have reliable power at their fingertips.

The microgrid delivers power to homes, a school, a church, a health center, three general stores and streetlights. The key to the success of this microgrid is the concept of Energy Daily Allowance, an agreed upon maximum amount of energy the homeowner can use. Each user has a meter that shows the available energy allowance and includes a signal to encourage or refrain consumption depending on energy use and amount of sun. More information about the program is available on the web site at www.indoorilite.com.