Use of solar energy could slash utility bills

[Naveed Yaseen]

Solar system can play a pivotal role in filling Pakistan’s energy gap

Sunday, March 29, 2009
By Israr Khan

BERLIN: Save money by day and sleep better at night. How? very simple, when you make the choice to go solar energy, you will sleep better knowing that you are doing your part to preserve the environment and leave a cleaner world for your children.

Better yet, you will applaud your sound financial decision every month when your meager utility bill arrives. You will reduce the amount of energy demand on over-stretched National Power System, lower your electricity costs, and provide a measure of protection against future utility rate hikes.

On a sunny day, the sun supplies around a 1,000 watts of energy on every square meter of the earth’s surface. The most appropriate method to conserve fuel sources and yet produce sufficient energy for our homes and factories is to collect this solar energy. Solar Panels collect sunrays and convert them into electricity or heat.

Solar thermal and Photovoltaic (PV) solar system could be used to fill Pakistan’s energy gap. The country at the moment is facing power shortfall of 1,500 to 2,500 megawatts reaching 4,000MW in peak seasons of summer and winter.

Last year, households, industries, public and private institutes and even hospitals faced frequent power breakdowns. When the sun could grow business and the economy, why is there talk of an energy crisis? With the solar energy you can light homes and hospitals and keep houses cool and warm in different seasons.

But, the reason is unfortunately powerful lobbies in the energy sector create hurdles. Use of the technology is growing fast in Germany, France, Greece, UK and US despite the fact that most of these countries have relatively a little sunlight. China retains over 400 photovoltaic (PV) companies and produces approximately 18 per cent of the photovoltaic products worldwide.

In 2007, it produced 1,700MW of solar panels, nearly half of the world production of 3,800MW, although 99 per cent were exported. It has installed about 80MW of photovoltaics. In India, one of the first applications of solar power has been for water pumping, to begin replacing India’s four to five million diesel powered water pumps, each consuming about 3.5 kilowatts, and off-grid lighting.

Some large projects have been proposed, and a 35,000 square kilometres area of the Thar Desert has been set aside for solar power projects, sufficient to generate 700 to 2,100 Gigawatts. When in Pakistan, where the sun is shining almost everyday, why not use this free source of energy? The shortsighted policies could be blamed as one of the major limitations hindering energy prosperity. There has not been a meaningful and coherent energy policy in place over this period. The approach has been “project-oriented,” rather than “goal-oriented.”

Almost every regime has dealt with energy on an ad hoc basis. A threefold increase in energy demand over the last two decades has been responded to with an ill-proportioned increment at the supply end.

Consequently, with the advent of 2008 the gap between demand and supply grew to 4,500MW indicating a 40 per cent deficit of electricity. The prevalent energy crisis has not appeared overnight, the omens were evident for a number of years but the authorities failed to react in time. Solar energy is reliable, environmental friendly, no health risk and could pay back the investment in a few years. Though at the moment the price of the solar energy is high but is falling. It is hoped that in next three to five years, the renewable energy price would match the traditional energy.

Many developing countries are facing energy shortages, which hamper their efforts to take more people out of poverty. By using alternative energy, wind and biomassófarmers, ranchers, business owners and homeowners can reduce their utility bills and stabilize electricity supplies. The introduction of solar energy, wind and biomass energy systems could provide economical ways to produce electricity and hot water for home and farm use and pumping water for livestock.

The renewable sources could help protect users from electricity price spikes, brownouts, rolling blackouts and other grid-related reliability and supply security issues. Solar energy is a small player in the energy field now because coal and other fossil fuels produce energy at a much lower cost. These fossil fuels, however, generate the carbon dioxide that causes global warming.

And they are not renewable. In 2050, our planet will need twice, as much energy as now produced to fill world needs. How can we reconcile rising demand with diminishing fossil fuels and curbing greenhouse gases? For many, the answer is solar energy.

In Berlin, you can see row after the row of solar panels installed on the rooftops of houses, schools, hospitals and markets either generating electricity or heating water for consumption. In some cases, the same hot water is used for cooling homes through the technology.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=169644