Energy workshop

The latest lecture was about different case studies, which were implemented in four people groups. The task was to provide renewable energy solution for a village, town or region in different developing countries. Our town was located in a remote area in India near the border with Nepal. The town was providing energy with a diesel engine for the health care center, police station and some other administration buildings, and was planning to buy a new engine for the citizens. Our task was to provide a sustainable electricity production system to replace this plan. In the task was given some observations about the weather conditions and rivers located nearby, which created some limitations but also opportunities for us.

First thing to solve the problem is to think about what kind of town it would be: sources of livelihood, infrastructure, environment and weather conditions. To be in such a remote area and located in a high altitude near the Himalaya, we concluded it to be maximum 10 000 inhabitants town where most people get their income by cattle raising and trading in a marketplace. The area has strong dry and rainy seasons during the year which contribute the water flow in the rivers. When it is not raining, there are wind and sun light sufficiently.

We planed to use micro hydro plant when it’s possible and during a dry season solar panels and biogas production. Our group disagreed should we also have used wind power because it was also available. In a biogas production the amount of animal waste could be used which is produced by the cattle. This gas could be used for cooking for example. Some problems defined were the continuation and maintenance of these systems. Especially this was the case in a biogas production system because it requires that the community is involved and the cattle farmers will supply the waste. Solar panels put on the roofs of the houses are also little bit problematic, should we rent the roofs or give the solar panels to the people. How expensive to combine all these electricity production systems, we did not have a clue. Investment would be of course expensive but in a long run it would pay itself back.

These kinds of exercises are really interesting but little knowledge of the technology and the costs are a huge barrier to achieve a good final result. But in this way we have opportunity to at least think of all the aspects needed to take into account. This case study would have been implemented also in a larger scale. Groups could have more time (like couple of weeks) to prepare a proper solution and to look out some information about the technologies available and the costs.