01 Case Study on Power divide in India During my last semester at National Institute of Design in 2014, I along with my two team mates worked on a project called ‘Power Divide in India’ – the project looked at the problems related to generation, transmission and distribution of electricity. This project was done as a part of our Systems Design Module. As a part of this course we were supposed to identify a wicked problem and try solving it through systemic design approach. The emphasis was on understanding of interrelationships within a system that make it a coherent whole and make overall systemic connections. The project was done within a period of 8 weeks. On the first day we all sat together and brainstormed to come up with as many wicked problems as we could. (The term “wicked” is used to denote resistance to resolution, rather than evil. Moreover, because of complex interdependencies, the effort to solve one aspect of a wicked problem may reveal or create other problems… Source: Wikipedia) India being a huge country in itself has interlinks that are so deep that these links create problems in themselves, being a nation of 1.2 billion, definitely has its fair share of issues and crisis. After completing the Initial phase of the project we came up with a lot of wicked problems. Following this we categorized them and tried to see if there were any parallels within these wicked problems. In the end we came up with problem areas and situations that were worthy of design project. Out of these multiple ideas we zeroed down to 4 problems – (1) Water Crises, (2) Population aging & problems of the elderly, (3) Electricity crises & (4) Loss of Biodiversity and Environmental Issues. Images (L to R) Brainstorming on the board, Idea Maps & Deep dive sheets for an Idea
We selected Electricity/Energy crises as a topic based on an election matrix that looked at the: 1.Wickedness of the Problem 2.Empathy (Most Important factor) 3.Access of information, 4.Time Constraint (so that we could to do justice to the topic) 5.Deliverables We started off with thorough secondary research looking at all forms of available data in newspapers, Internet and books. We came up with insightful data that gave us a strong context. Problem scenario: India needs additional 100,000 MW of power generation by 2017 to meet the growing demand of the economy. The planning commission accepts it but environmental ministry rejects this because this target is ecologically unstable. The problem becomes further complex as power generation by law is supposed to be completely state owned. To add to the sorry state of affairs, people steal electricity, tamper the electricity meter readings and in general lack the attitude for energy conservation. Sustainable and renewable energy generation like solar and hydroelectricity is hugely expensive, so it cannot be deployed at a large scale. Adding to this, 300 million people in India still do not have access to electricity. Most of the power plants are really old and need infrastructural upgradation and there is lack of funds. Overall it’s a complex cycle where 29 State/Provincial Government blame the Central main government for not allocating enough energy to them and the government blames the predecessors and citizens, and moreover do not adopt any power conservation practises and some even steal electricity through direct hooking and tampering electromechanical meters.