Workshop: Energy

In many developing countries where 75% of the population live in the rural areas, the question of access to the main electric grid source is the very tricky one. Usually governments in these regions refuse to invest on electrification projects due to high initial cost of investment, minimal return, difficult terrain and inconvenience in maintenance and billing to mention some.

In this workshop different case studies in developing countries related to lack of access to electricity were presented...

I was a member of a team who explored socially, economically and environmentally sustainable alternatives to power up a school in the middle of a notorious new slum in Addis ababa. In our case study, the problem stems from the fact that a NGO is willing to build a school for the slum community but only if it would be electrified. As the government refused to electrify the school, we jumped to the rescue with our decentralized energy solution.

As Addis ababa is located in the tropical area, our main choice as an alternative source of energy was the Sun. So, after we collected money from community savings and funds from different environmental groups we bought the following materials:

1. Five solar Panels
2. Bio gas Generator
3. Batteries
4. Materials for Bio gas plant

On any ordinary day in Addis ababa we can get enough energy from the sun to power up the whole school. But keeping some foggy days in mind, we built a bio gas plant that drives our small backup generator. we collect our input for the bio gas plant from the school toilet and the slum community. In cases when we produce more energy from the solar panels than we need, we charge our batteries. the batteries later can be used to charge the Mobile phones of the community for small charges.

Since looting is the main problem in the slum, the whole power and bio gas plant will be kept in the school yard and watched by the guard.