Pushing for solar systems

TECHNICIANS from Forum Island Countries gather in Fiji later this month for a workshop on how to install, operate and maintain small scale photovoltaic systems.

Photovoltaic (PV) - the process by which light energy from the sun is directly converted into electricity - could be the answer to rural electrification in Forum Island Countries.

The 12-day Photovoltaic (PV) Systems Installation, Operation and Maintenance workshop is organised by the Forum Secret ariat’s energy division for about 20 Forum Island Countries field technicians.

The workshop runs from May 11-22 at the Centre for Approriate Technology at Nadave outside Suva.

Its objective is to train more local field technicians using previously trained local instructors.

The workshop reflects increasing emphasis being placed on harnessing the sun’s energy to produce electricity for household use especially in the rural areas of Forum Island Countries.

Sunshine is abundant in the Pacific and this makes it an attractive source of energy.

While petroleum products such as fuel and kerosene will continue to be in use for a long time to come, their long-term use is shrouded in uncertainties due to escalating costs and unreliable transport to take these to the rural areas.

As well, growing environmental concerns about mankind’s dependence on non-renewable energy sources such as fossil fuels and nuclear have prompted governments the world over to look at alternative sources of energy including solar.

Indeed, solar energy is now well placed to becoming that alternative energy source for the 21st century and beyond.

Of course, developing and making solar energy work in the South Pacific has indeed been punctuated with success and failures over the past decade, due mainly to lack of support for what essentially was a young technology.

While some early equipment and system design was found to be poor, in the main, the failures were ue to lack of back up service such as operator training and regular maintenance.

Enormous progress has been made as a result of improved technology. In many areas including Forum Island Countries, solar energy has been successfully utilised to produce enough electricity for household uses such as lighting, communications and hot water.

One such success story from Tuvalu where photovoltaic lighting systems have worked so well that it is now being used as a model for similar development in other Island States.

Initially, 170 household lighting systems provided by the USAID-funded Save the Children Foundation were installed there in 1984-85. The European Community, under its 1986-87 Lome II Pacific Regional Energy Programme funded a further 158 units which were installed in homes and eight meeting houses.

Today, some 30 per cent of rural household in Tuvalu have solar-powered electricity-thanks to the Tuvalu Solar Electric

Co-operative Society (TSECS).

Established in 1984, TSECS distributes, services and maintains solar-powered household lighting systems on the country’s outer islands.

Much of its equipment is acquired through foreign aid.

Residents who have the system installed at their home each pay a SASO deposit plus a monthly rental fee of 5A7.60 for two panel system or SAG.2S for one panel system to cover maintenance and replacement costs.

Together with others such as the South Pacific Institute for

The Forum

Renewable Energy (SPIRE) based in Pape’ete, Tahiti, the Forum Secretariat’s Energy Division has been involved in the TSECS scheme in a number of ways.

Through its Small Energy Projects Programme (SEPP), the division has supplied replacement batteries while the EC has provided equipment to upgrade some units.

But it is not only in rural areas that solar energy is making a splash.

In Funafuti, Tuvalu’s capital, what is said to be the first solar-powered satellite earth station in the South Pacific region is in operation since it was installed there with the help of the Forum Secretariat’s Telecommunications Division last year.

This system ensures that Tuvalu has a voice to the outside world even when the

diesel-based power supply in Funafuti fails. The photovoltaic unit to power the satellite earth station was funded by the Energy Division under its Small Energy Projects Programme

(Sepp).

The success of this system has now been extended to a similar EC-funded satellite earth station nearing completion on Kiritimati Island in nearby Kiribati.

Organisations such as SPIRE and the Forum Secretariat’s energy division which now absorbed the UN Pacific Energy Development Programme (PEDP) have continued to work together to end shortage of trained manpower which impeded progress in solar power development in the past.

For instance, this month’s PV workshop is an attempt to meet this need by training more local technicians who can install, operate and maintain solar-powered units in their own country.

Solar power development, however, is a small part of what the Forum Secretariat’s energy division has been doing and continues to do in the energy sector.

Under a restructured division approved by the Forum Officials Committee last July and coincided with the winding up of the UN Pacific Energy Development Programme (PEDP), the new-look energy division has three sections dealing with renewables, petroleum and power. A recruitment drive is underway to fill specialist positions in these sections.

Brian Dawson, who has been appointed director, will have the overall administrative control of the division. Mr Dawson who has worked for the secretariat previously took up his appointment last month.

A SFI.3 million budget has been earmarked for the division’s thrust over the next few years.

Among other things, Forum Island Countries will be provided with advice and assistance in the petroleum sector and in electric power sector planning.

Advice and assistance will also be given on renewable energy technologies, conservation and management as well as in environmental issues relating to the energy sector.

The division will provide advice and assistance in training and in identifying sources of international funding for energy projects in Forum Island Countries.

At the same time it is continuing to develop a more strategic approach to defining energy priorities for the region.

It seems photovoltaic system has worked in Tuvalu. Just how many other Forum Island Countries will follow in its footsteps, only time will tell. But it seems that solar energy is now perhaps the answer to basic energy needs in the rural areas where an estimated 80 per cent of the Forum Island Countries’ 5 million people still live today. D

Alfred

Sasako