The state of preparedness of the country for generation of the energy it requires and the quality or efficiency of the technology used in the generation can be well analysed by the indicators of installed capacity and capacity utilisation of resources respectively. The electricity sector in India had an installed capacity of 250.256 GW as of end July 2014. Non-renewable power plants constitute 87.55% of the installed capacity and renewable power plants constitute the remaining 12.45% of the total installed capacity. There is no infinite reserve of non-renewable energy resources to sustain the ever increasing human population. Thus efforts are being made to improve renewable energy (RE) technologies.

Government with the help of Civil Society Organisations (CSO), Private Sector Entrepreneurs and Consulting Firms has now started working in the area of Decentralised Distributed Generation (DDG)² to boost the generation facility. This has resulted in extended supply hours in rural areas which has made economic activity possible.

A special focus on deploying renewable energy for rural electrification is helping people take up employment in electricity generation projects and rural constructions. Study hours in the villages are increasing. Education and awareness is helping people take up self-employment and be self-reliant.

Different types of renewable energy technologies such as Solar Home System (SHS), Biomass, Biogas and Improved Cooking Stoves (ICS) are suitable for rural India. The RE sector is now visibly creating green jobs and linking businesses especially in the rural markets. Hundreds of local youths are now working in the rural areas as technicians. The burden on women has reduced dramatically as they no longer have to clean kerosene soot and work under dim light. They are confidently taking part in home based income generation activities. For rural businesses, power means more productivity, more sales, more income and more jobs. A rural business could double its turnover by using power now made available through DDG renewable sources while minimising energy cost as paid to the local diesel generator operator.

Exploring Opportunities

The problem with the rural Indian economy is to sustain the cost of electricity thus produced. Solutions need to be designed on community to community basis matching with the peculiarities of a particular village.

A powerful economic model under the aegis of the Society for Technology and Action for Rural Advancement’s SPEED (Smart Power for Environmentally-sound Economic Development) programme is being crafted to make renewable energy a part of rural life, integrating one of most sophisticated technologies with the aspirations, toils and successes of the rural people. A rural family can have bright light, power their mobile phones, run fans and watch TV at the same cost as burning five liters of kerosene oil while escaping from dim light, foul smelling smoke including health and fire hazards. The availability of power helps to improve connectivity. Increase in the sale of electronic goods is quite evident thus creating new business opportunities such as mobile phone re-charging shops, electronics repair, maintenance shops, community television centers and creating a whole new ecosystem of services through OORJAgrams.³

Conclusion

Renewable energy technologies are expensive as compared to traditional energy sources. One of the initial challenges is to bring down the high upfront cost of RE based power and distribution facilities. An innovative ‘pay as you use’ through a mobile based financial scheme is working fantastically which reduces the cost of a connection to less than what was spent on monthly kerosene cost.

Rural people are completely unaware of DDG renewable energy technologies. Winning rural confidence can play a vital role in achieving 100% rural electrification through decentralised renewable energy. q

Endnotes

1 Energy Statistics 2013 publication is brought out every year by the Central Statistics Office (CSO). To read please visit: http://mospi.nic.in/mospi_new/upload/Energy_Statistics_2013.pdf

2 Decentralised Distributed Generation (DDG): Here energy is generated or stored by a variety of small, grid-connected devices. For detailed information please visit : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed _generation.

3 OORJAgram: Caters to electrification and services needs of rural household communities in Diyara, an island in the middle of River Ganga between Patna and Saran districts. Read story - https://www.linkedin.com/pub/dr-utparn-dubey/1b/5b8/881