The inspiration from India

The visit in India was viewed with much excitement by the participants before, during and after. An excursion and workshop, “Solar Learning”⁵², was organized in parallel with the case study as mentioned earlier. This gave an opportunity for the project members to interact with invited guests from outside of the team, both from Kenya, India and Norway. On the bus from Kolkata towards the ferry to the Sunderban Islands, there was vigorous exchange of information and ideas on solar PV technology and rural electrification, although many of the participants had just met for the first time. The project team members had met for the second time, five months after the meeting in Oslo, and were eager to find out what could be learned for the task ahead in Kenya.

From Kenya, five persons attended in addition to the five Kenyan team members:

The contact from Kenya Power, a government official from Kitui County (drought management officer), a project installer, a solar battery producer, and a coordinator of a solar energy association. The initial plan had also been to invite people from a village in Kenya, but it became difficult at this early stage. The visit took place towards the end of the process of selecting a place in Kenya. During the stay in India there were conversations on the coming work in Kenya both within the team and with other participants. Specific challenges were discussed, for example how to avoid payment problems and battery problems. New types of electricity meters for mini-grids were mentioned by WBREDA, and alternative arrangements for collection of payment from the customers were discussed.

6.4.1. Early “spin-off” projects in Kenya

Most of the team members had not seen solar mini-grids before, and not this size of solar PV installations (up to 110 kW). This in itself was inspiring, although the problems of these impressive solar power plants also became clear. In hindsight the team learned just as much from the problems as from the well-working features, but during the first days the excitement was strong. “Seeing is believing”, according to the participant from the Kenyan government.

52 Supported by the Research Council of Norway’s GLOBMEK program

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The abovementioned government contact was the one who acted fastest after the trip and surprised the team by initiating some immediate work in Kenya inspired by the information obtained in India. Right after the visit, he wrote a report to the Ministry of Energy where he explained the technical details of the solar PV-systems that he had seen in India, and included pictures of the panels, batteries and “power conditioning units” (charging regulators and inverters). He had earlier suggested to the Ministry of Energy that he would be interested to try out solar PV in one of the government’s remote, isolated diesel power grids.

He was looking for a way of saving fuel costs. The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Energy had previously not been supportive of the plans, but the report from India with pictures of large solar PV installations convinced him, according to our contact, that it could be feasible to combine the use of solar PV panels with power generation by the diesel generators. This was a different use of solar PV than had been observed in India, but the Indian solar mini-grids gave some relevant information and demonstration.

During the first three years after the visit in India, this work continued, and the Government of Kenya added solar PV capacity in five isolated power grids (first Merti, then Habaswein, Hola, Elwak and Lodwar) as a complement to the large diesel generators that were already there. These immediate quick and unexpected effects of the project inspired the team during the whole project, while working to develop the local project in Ikisaya village which started operating two years later. These immediate effects in Kenya were not created by this single event alone, though, it was most likely also facilitated by the general development in the solar PV field, nationally and internationally, including existing suppliers who could install larger systems, increasing use of solar PV worldwide, and ongoing price-drops.

In addition to the understanding of the Sunderban solar mini-grids, which were studied in depth, the Indian team member provided a glimpse into a different model. The team was invited and recommended to see two small solar charging stations that were part of their large activity in India for provision of light for households (Lighting a Billion Lives, LaBL). These charging stations consisted of a building owned by an organization or a private person, a solar panel on the roof, junction boxes (charging boxes) mounted on the wall inside the house and a number of portable lanterns that were plugged in for charging. The lanterns were rented out to people, who would then carry them home and use them in the evening and night, and thereafter come back on the next day to deliver them for charging. People paid a fee for the renting and the operator got some payment for the job. NGOs acted as intermediates between the implementing agency and the local charging stations.

Based on this observation, the same government person and two other participants from Kenya developed plans for a small charging station in Kenya, spontaneously, during the trip. This would be implemented in one of the two villages that he had suggested for the Solar Transitions project, Nasigel. His two partners for this project were a Kenyan team member who was both a solar business person (selling solar lanterns and solar home systems) and energy researcher, and a renewable energy expert (technical expert and importer and installer of power stations) in Kenya. They figured out how they could construct a small solar charging station for renting of portable lanterns with equipment that was already available in the Kenyan market: small solar LED lanterns with separate solar panels. They would mount

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all the small solar panels that belonged to the lanterns together in rows in a tailor made metal rack so that the lanterns could be connected and charged in one place, at a school, and rented out at a low price to school children and their families. The three people said they wanted to act faster than the plan was for the Solar Transitions project. Nasigel “charging kiosk” was implemented six months later, with much excitement and a newspaper piece because Kenya Power contributed funds for this activity from their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) budget.

6.4.2. The use of research findings and lessons learned in India

Sessions for sharing of research findings on the Indian case study were organized in project meetings, and results of the case study were distributed among team members by email, after some of the team members had written about them. The Indian experiences were also repeatedly referred to by team members in discussions about the Kenyan model, both during and long after the stay in India.

Different team members brought along and emphasized different aspects of the mini-grid systems studied in the Sunderban Islands. Some showed concern about the challenges in reaching all community members, and the electricity customers’ need for some flexibility in how and when to use the electricity. Others showed more concern for the importance of the local operators and their motivation, or the challenges of building up an organizational framework for the management, operation, and maintenance of the systems.

A session of a team meeting in Nairobi in October 2010 was devoted to reflections on what had been learned from India both through the case study research and observations by team members who had participated in the study tour only. Several of the team members mentioned that they were impressed by the willingness of WBREDA to share all their experiences, also the problems they had faced, and this was found to be positive for the team’s work in Kenya. Another comment was that it is important to influence the government in Kenya to support such energy supply, like the Indian Government does. A lesson learned by team members was also that it is important to create flexibility in the use of electricity. In a power system with a limited amount of power available, it is important to focus on avoiding over-consumption and payment failure from the customers, some argued.

Others added that it is equally important to facilitate increased use of electricity when people gradually find out how they can use it and benefit from it.

The idea of using portable, chargeable lamps was mentioned as very interesting, and it was discussed whether school children could carry the lamps since the parents would not have time to go every day to charge the lamp. One of the team members said that women should be involved in the collection of tariffs since they tend to be more honest. Another team member pointed out that there are big differences between Sunderban and Ikisaya so that “we have to think for ourselves as much as transferring ideas and knowledge from India”.

This seemed to be a common view in the team, and the ideas for the power supply in Ikisaya did move away from the model studied in the Sunderban, but only gradually. In addition to these points, many of those research findings presented on the Indian case study in Chapter 5 seemed to be shared by several team members.

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