Renewable energy village
Country: Nepal
Project Manager: Pushkar Manandhar
This is the fourth phase of the Renewable Energy Village (REV) Project, which aims to enhance the opportunities of marginalised rural families in the villages of Hurhuredanda at Nawalparasi District in Nepal, by increasing their access to clean energy services.
Families are already beginning to benefit from electricity as a result of small-scale wind turbines combined with solar photo-voltaic and WLED (White Light Emitting Diode) technologies with smaller power outputs, which can provide electricity for more households. This phase of the project is focusing on reducing the cost of wind energy systems by promoting local resources and enabling some of the community to generate income through maintaining the systems.
The specific objectives of the project are:
- To demonstrate and promote low-cost small wind energy technology
- To promote affordable WLED lamps powered by wind energy systems
- To build the capacities of local institutions and families to help ensure sustainable management of wind energy systems and to promote efficient energy use within their homes.
Highlights of the year
Five 150w wind turbines together with eight solar panels of 43wp were integrated to form a wind solar hybrid energy system to power the community charging station in Hurhuredanda, Nawalparasi. The community charging centre is now providing power to 95 units of rechargeable LED lamps. The 46 households of Hurhuredanda village now have a lighting facility during the night, this has brought various benefits to the households. The children can complete their homework every day and women are cooking their evening meals in ample light and they finish their cleaning on time which gives them spare time for other productive or recreation activities. Moreover, the charging station proved to be very effective in enhancing communication services of communities in Hurhuredanda. The numbers of households using mobile phones increased significantly after the charging station started to generate energy. There were more than 25 new mobile phone users within 6 weeks of the mobile phone charging facility opening.
The energy produced from the wind solar hybrid system is further linked to income generating activities through collection of service costs for charging LED lamps and mobile phones. As decided by the community, the single charging cost for a LED lamp is NPR5. The collected funds are spent on repairs and maintenance and also to provide a monthly salary for the technical staff.
Similarly, more than 266 units of solar power LED lamps were supported in Bhumlichowk VDC, Gorkha benefiting 266 households. One local co-operative in Bhumlichowk is established to run as a financial intermediary which can fund the capital investment for energy services such as micro hydro project and solar or wind chargeable lights to the member households. The fund has already accumulated a total loan investment exceeding NPR3.7 million. As a result the local people now have access to financing their energy need.
406 households have access to clean energy.
This project is funded by UK trust funds, Livelihoods and Forestry Programme (LFP), UKaid from DFID and individual supporters
