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Posing for the camera, Mr. Gunapala Seneviratne and family stand on their porch under a solar lamp. The light is powered by a solar photovoltaic panel that has just been installed on their roof. For five hours technicians from SELCO Solar Lanka, a local solar company, have been busy installing this 40 W, five light, one electric outlet, solar home system in Maihyangane, Sri Lanka. But this rural farming...
Innovative self-financing integrated development concepts enable even the world's poorest to finance their own development. Mass applications for PV (and alternative energy in general) offer ethical least-cost solutions to some of the most widespread problems facing mankind. T.E. Manning describes how PV technologies can be usefully incorporated without subsidy or paternalism in development projects.
The International Solar Energy Society has been experiencing an extraordinary period of change of late, in this article, Rian Van Staden, new Executive Director of ISES highlights current developments and initiatives at the organisation.
New and renewable sources of energy can make an increasing contribution to the energy supply mix of developing countries in view of favourable renewable energy resource endowments, limitations and uncertainties of fossil fuel supplies, adverse balance of payments, and the increasing pressure on the environment from conventional energy generation. Among the renewable energy technologies, the generation...
The green electricity market is rapidly developing on an international scale, with an ever-increasing concentration of trade at the EU level. In this article Geert Palmers, of 3E NV in Belgium presents his viewpoint on the market mechanisms necessary to prepare for this international trade, while maintaining the subsidiarity at the demand side of the market, and maintaining the ambitions of a recent...
Solar energy, already familiar in static applications like heating, powering small appliances and battery charging, is also being harnessed to the more dynamic problems of movement - over land, sea or in the air. Directly solar-powered transportation may be on the fringe at present, but it is holding out promise for reduced usage of fossil fuels, with consequent economic and environmental benefits...
Generating electricity from wind power has received a fair amount of attention in the UK over the last 12 months, for example, because of the Kyoto Protocol and the UK's aim to generate 10% of electricity from renewable sources by 2010 (wind is seen as an important contributor to this target). Even the Ministry of Defence (MOD) has entered into the debate due to its reservations regarding the negative...
Laranda Solar Technologies Sdn. Bhd. and Sekolah Sri Cempaka have recently formed an alliance to embark on a campaign to create awareness among the Malaysian community on the many benefits of solar energy. Our efforts have included setting up a 1 kW peak grid connected solar electricity system on the balcony of Sekolah Sri Cempaka and by assuming the responsibilities for the Malaysian Chapter of the...
Even before September 11, the world's governments were beginning to look at energy policy in the light of new pressures. Fluctuating oil and gas prices had already brought energy security to the fore in some countries, and the declining nuclear industry is creating fear of a looming gap in electricity generation capacity on both sides of the Atlantic. Finally, the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions...
As wind farms increasingly spring up all over the world, the complexities of wind farm placement become ever more demanding. Choosing suitable and appropriate sites, minimising their environmental impact and optimising their output become increasingly sophisticated juggling acts. The process can be made easier and lead to significant increases in output with the aid of computer aided design packages...
In December 1996, the Electricity Market Directive (96/92/EC) was adopted. It came into force in February 1997 with the objective to provide competition within each national electricity market and to ultimately create one European market for electric power. Some countries have since gone faster than others in opening up their market to competition (e.g. Sweden, Germany, United Kingdom). Reciprocity...
The UK, in particular Scotland, possesses the largest share of the onshore wind resource in Europe. As part of its contribution to addressing the problem of global climate change, the UK Government is committed to putting in place mechanisms to ensure that, by the year 2010, 10% of total UK electricity supply shall be sourced from renewable energy. Of this target, the present UK Government anticipates...
Despite the complexity associated with climate change, the European Union should move ahead in an aggressive fashion to ratify, as well as persuade other countries to ratify, the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change according to many speakers at a recent high-level conference of leading European politicians, industrialists, and environmentalists in London. Don Smith reports.
Taking existing technologies simply off the shelf and handing them over to users might in the beginning satisfy stakeholders and users involved in a rural electrification project but the likelihood of failure and disappointment is very high. Pitfalls are well known and have led to a slow down of entrepreneurial initiatives and market development. In Indonesia with its long history of harnessing new...
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