6 minute read
Why Energy and Water Access Matters Across Africa (and what do do about it)
Energy and water are the enablers ofeconomic and social development
In March of last year, the World Bank put out a report on electricity access in sub-Saharan Africa. The study measured how people were both able and unable to access electricity by region and country. The findings were a wakeup call for policy makers. Much of Africa is lagging when it comes to the public’s ability to access the energy grid. On average, only 43% of people in Africa have access to electricity, which is just over half the global access rate of 87%. The report also warned that this percentage isn’t likely to shift, given Africa’s population growth.
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For many of us, the thought of living without uninterrupted access to electricity and water is unimaginable. But it’s a reality for hundreds of millions of people across emerging markets. The lack of access to electricity dramatically alters people’s quality of life; it also holds back economic growth and educational opportunities.
There are two core challenges when it comes to ensuring universal access to energy and water. The first is connecting remote locations to the grid. For marginal communities which are positioned far away from urban centers, the cost of bringing these communities online can seem prohibitive. And then there’s the ability to provide power 24/7. How many people who live in marginal communities will be able to pay for both grid connectivity and reliable power? For most, the cost of connecting and ensuring a power supply is out of reach.
But there are companies working on providing solutions to powering marginal communities. One is Schneider Electric. The firm is using its technology to provide sustainable power and water to hundreds of thousands of people across countries in Africa.
“Having access to a safe, reliable source of energy is a basic human right, and yet far too many people do without. We’ve got to change this, and it has to happen through green, sustainable technologies”, explains Saif Eldemerdash, Home & Distribution Vice President for the North East Africa & Levant at Schneider Electric.
Schneider’s approach is both simple and effective. Give people both the technology and the training needed to maintain it. One example of this is the work that Schneider is doing in Egypt to provide marginal communities with energy sources. One such region is Abu Ghraked village in South Sinai, which is home to over 300 people and where the closest highway is 150 kilometres away and leads to Sharm El Sheikh.
Schneider’s solution is both simple and sustainable. A solar power plant consisting of 55kWh photovoltaic cells, eight current inverters, a variable voltage protection system, and 48 deep-duty batteries power the village day and night. The company has also donated 24 Mobiya solar lanterns to residents and installed 10 solar-powered street lights. The system can be remotely monitored through software, and is being maintained by the village’s residents who have been trained to perform maintenance. The village loads are fed by solar energy throughout the day, and additional energy is stored using batteries to feed the village at night.
The new energy plant, which will serve Abu Ghoraked’s 300 residents, including 35 houses, a school, a mosque, a hospital and a meeting hall, is a transformation, not just in terms of reliability but also when it comes to the environment. The village loads were previously fed using a generator with a capacity of 30kvh for only six hours a day. The cost of the project is just over US$ 300,000, which has been donated by Schneider Electric.
By working in partnership with both the authorities and residents, Schneider Electric is focussed on building clean energy capacity for marginal communities. As Eldemerdash points out, energy is an enabler of economic and societal development. Energy is often used for essentials such as lighting, refrigeration, and for pumping and irrigation.
Schneider’s team has worked to put in place an efficient solution. Solar panels power submersible pumps, which feed water from two wells up to crops on the surface. The panels can generate over 180 MWh of energy a year, which is more than enough energy to extract 328,000 cubic metres of water annually. The solution includes flow meters and internet-enabled hardware, which allows El-Hiez’s residents to track both how much energy is produced and how much water is pumped in real time. That water feeds over 144 acres of agricultural land, which is tended to by 18 families in the area. The village’s residents have been trained on how to operate the system, and now the whole village benefits from reliable power and sustainable access to water. In addition, there’s minimal water wastage. Schneider engineers are able to help maintain the system remotely via an internet connection.
The water extraction project in El- Hottayah village, in El Farafra Governorate is another of Schneider Electric’s20 initiatives to promote sustainable development. The residents of the village extracted water from their well using a 100-Kilowatt generator to operate a pump, which consumed 10 litres of diesel per hour. The extracted water was not enough to grow 60 acres. Schneider Electric’s solution now provides enough water to grow 380 acres, which will be a boon to developing the area and creating jobs. The new setup has reduced carbon emissions by 47 tonness a year, contributing to a healthier environment both for residents and for farming.
“What we want to do is put in place technologies that are effective enough to change lives, but which are also simple enough for them to be looked after by those same communities,” explains Schneider Electric’s CSR and Social Lead, Asmaa El Shiemy. “These solutions are green, they’re suited to the landscapes of the region, and they’re efficient. They’re also much more cost-effective and environmentally-friendly than what was used before, like diesel generators. There are answers to powering marginal communities, and I hope what we are doing will serve as a model to others as to how we can best power remote communities and help them build sustainable ways of living and working”.
For Schneider’s Eldemerdash, the challenge of how to connect marginal communities to the grid is an opportunity in disguise. A focus of the Schneider Electric Foundation is training and development, particularly for renewable technologies in Africa and Asia. In South Africa alone, the Foundation has provided training to over 30,000 people. Last year, Schneider Electric joined a coalition to drastically expand trainings in the energy sector through the Power for All #PoweringJobs campaign. While its primary aim is to address the skills gap in emerging countries, the campaign is also focussed on speeding up the deployment of decentralised renewable energy solutions. As Eldemerdash points out, emerging economies stand to gain the most from the adoption of renewable solutions if they spend more on training.“The renewable energy jobs market is huge. The direct job potential for decentralised renewable energy solutions is 4.5 million by 2030. And data suggests that solar lighting alone could generate two million jobs. Many of these new roles will be created in emerging markets. Take the example of India, where rooftop solar creates seven times as many jobs per megawatt as utility-scape solar. Replacing kerosene lamps with solar lighting systems could create 500,000 new jobs in West African countries. Governments in emerging markets must see the potential of renewable energy to transform not just marginal communities, but their societies as a whole”.
