The use of solar energy has not been
opened up because the oil industry does not own the sun.
--Ralph Nader, Politician and
Activist
In these days of escalating oil prices, it’s becoming extremely
difficult for a common citizen to pay off monthly electricity bills.
The bills keep soaring day by day and there seems to be no respite
in foreseeable future. These bills can be reduced by resorting to
other methods of generating electricity, solar being one of them.
This article dwells on the discussion regarding production of
electricity through solar means and discusses a cost-effective
strategy to achieve this end.
The use of solar energy for the generation of electricity is not
something new. Most of the countries are doing it successfully for
decades and their population benefiting through the use of this free
resource. But, to most of the people, it may still look like a
mystery. These days, this energy is being utilized to light our
homes, run fans, provide power to our fridges and microwave ovens,
assist in warming our homes and swimming pools, provide power to our
gardens and street lights, run our TVs and computers, and extract
water from the sub-soil for irrigation purposes.
A practical example of the use of solar energy could be seen in some
villages of Pakistan where each house has been provided with a solar
panel that’s sufficient to run an electric fan and two energy
saving bulbs. Prior to this arrangement, the whole village used to
be plunged in pitch dark during night. One such example is the
village with the name of Narian Khorian, some 50
kilometers away from Islamabad, where 100 solar panels
have been installed by a local firm, free of cost, to
promote the use of solar energy among the masses. Through these
panels, the residents of 100 households are enjoying light and fan
facilities. Had these panels not been installed, the people living
in this area wouldn’t have even dreamt of getting this facility
for decades as the provision of electricity from the national grid
was a far cry due to the difficult terrain and high expenses
involved.. read complete article at
http://pakistaniat.com/2009/02/17/utilizing-solar-energy-in-pakistan/
--
By Air Cdre (R) Azfar A Khan, E-mail:
azfar44@hotmail.com
Comment 1
Choosing feral zebra for a cart instead of donkey is always an
absurd idea. When we know that we have numerous other resources for
the production of electricity then why to go for a costly one? I m
not declaring the sunlight a costly one, but it is obvious that the
cost of the solar projects and devices are far greater than their
efficiency, at-least, for the current age. The devices installed in
Narian Khorian can produce a few kW of electricity each, which can
run only a fan and a couple of energy savers at each house! So, even
if we say that such devices are relatively cheap and affordable, we
can not deny the fact that today's life is more digital and
"electrified" than before. Almost everything is depending upon
electricity now. Our life is now nearly incomplete without a
considerable of electric power. Thus, such mini projects will never
satisfy our needs of power. Here, i m not criticizing those
individuals who are trying to install such solar projects. Everyone
has got the right to install whatever he wants in his own house. But
it will be an awkward act if it is carried out by any Governmental
Organisation or any NGO. If we look at it from the eyes of an
engineer and economist then we see that spending millions on such
projects will mean wasting them, because the output will not an
appreciable one. We can afford to this in two cases:
(1) if we are running out of other resources
(2) if we have more efficient, more powerful but cheaper solar
devices.
It is clear that we are not in any situation like any of the above.
So instead of chasing a wild goose we must strive hard to use the
other cheap resources like water, gas and coal. We have numerous
suitable locations for Hydel Power Projects in various parts of KPK.
We have gas reserves in Balochistan and we have huge amount of coal
in the desert of Thar. If we make even 80% use of these resources
,we will not face any load shedding until , at least, for the next
half a century.
In a nut shell, it is an appeal to all the Govt Organizations and
NGOs that if they want to get rid of power crisis, they will need to
take bigger steps and they ll need to think of producing "kilos of
Mega Watts" not of just few "kilo Watts"!!