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Posted Monday, May 10, 2004 17:05 GMT
The problem with energy in Africa is not generating it, but getting it to the people who need it. Since most Africans still live in rural areas with no access to national power grids, hundreds of millions of people continue to cook with wood or charcoal and use candlelight at night. In South Africa, the government has decided to bring power to the people. Over the next decade, its nongrid electrification scheme aims to deliver clean, sustainable solar energy to 300,000 homes across the country. Under the scheme, houses in rural areas are fitted with 1-m-by-30-cm photovoltaic panels that produce up to 200 W of electricity per day — just enough to power four light bulbs, a television and radio, and a cell-phone charger. The system costs about $615, most of which is subsidized by the government, while customers pay a one-off $15 application fee and then $9 a month. The scheme, which began in 1999, has so far wired just over 20,000 homes. But even that small number makes a big difference. "It's helping people to do simple things," says George Van Der Merwe, a consultant to South Africa's National Electricity Regulator, "to have access to a safer energy form instead of paraffin." The program is being improved as it's rolled out in other parts of the country. "We're learning more all the time," says Yaw Afrane-Okese, a renewable energy specialist. "We want to make the system as simple as possible, because that will give it the best chance of working."
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