I recently returned from India, where hundreds of millions of people -- 45 percent of the rural population -- live in villages with no electricity. Many of them are poor and live with the stubborn problems of illiteracy, malnutrition and hardship that no aid program has been able to fix. Now, however, some development experts and entrepreneurs are beginning to consider these people "energy-poor," and a world of difference resides in the distinction.
That's because solutions to being energy-poor are popping up all over the place. Solar lanterns are becoming available for the equivalent of U.S. $10 as prices for solar materials continues to drop, and better cookstoves are available that make more heat with less fuel. Biogas digesters are starting to provide electricity to whole villages. The thinking is that if the rural poor get more power -- literally, in the form of renewable heat and light -- their other problems might begin to take care of themselves.
Of course, it's not as simple as giving a rice farmer a solar lantern. Here's a look at the potential solutions and problems.
In the West and in other developed parts of the world, renewable-energy technologies like solar panels and wind turbines serve a different role than a place like rural India. They are "green" technologies that will one day supplant the polluting energy-producing technologies we already have, like coal, oil, and nuclear power (Japan's tsunami and the oil spill in the Gulf have cautioned us against relying too heavily on these). But our baseline supply of power is abundant. We've got the electricity we need to light classrooms, keep streets safe and heat our homes.
But for the four billion people in Africa, Asia and Latin America who have little or no access to electricity, the prospect of locally sourced, renewable power is quite literally a game-changer. They're no longer living in the dark. A solar-powered LED bulb provides enough light for the kids to study at night or for the parents to do important chores. A stove that uses less fuel could save a mother a few hours every day scavenging for firewood. And then there's the health benefits. It's estimated [pdf] that the emissions from kerosene lanterns and poorly-designed stoves contribute to half a million deaths in India each year, and cause four to six percent of all disease-related deaths in the country.Additionally, Solar Fusion a Tampa based company has teamed up with a not for profit organization called Project Reverb which focuses on changing the World first by meeting the immediate need than providing continual education and training along with providing finance for micro-enterprises, creating a Reverberation that changes the World one tribe at a time. Contact Solar Fusion for more information.
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