[:en] This month, Smart Villages and LCEDN are partnering with Power for All to bring you a webinar about the nexus between universal healthcare (SDG3) and universal electricity access (SDG7). As a follow up to our February webinar, “Healthy villages are smart villages”, we’ll ask – how does distributed renewable energy help to make villages …
Scaling up distributed renewable energy for healthcare in India Read More »
[:en] Maarten Strengers, Founder, Greenlink Location: De Bildt, Netherlands / Tanzania “We’re building a company, we’re not rescuing Africa.” As an electrical, mechanical and ICT engineer, Maarten Strengers flies to Africa when his technical know-how is needed; when there is a problem with installation capacity, or to advise on a solar community centre. “After a …
Greenlink: We’re building a company, we’re not rescuing Africa Read More »
[:en] Interview with Vishnu Raghunathan CEO & Co-Founder at Lytyfy “The appeal of the product is there only if the financing is there. So we decided to group the product with the financing.” After college, Vishnu Raghunathan and S. Deepak Kumar spent more than two years working for the Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society, a …
[:en] Augustine Ndasi, Managing Director, Haute Energy Systems Ltd. Location: Limbe, South West Region, Cameroon “As we say in our dialect – no point waiting for someone, it’s better to get going!” Augustine Ndasi did not count on lugging equipment, weighing 12 tonnes, through rough terrain on the border of Congo. One tubular battery, which …
Competition was fierce in each of our photography categories: we received photos from over 200 people in more than 50 countries! We are pleased to feature the winners below – just click to open the gallery and learn more about the people in the photograph as well as the photographers themselves. In addition to their …
Congratulations to the winners of the Smart Villages 2017 Photo Competition! Read More »
ICT is clearly a game changer both for on-grid and off-grid areas of the world. With smartphones, people in remote, “last mile” areas are increasingly gaining access to the internet and gaining access to information, social media, entertainment, and communication with far-flung family and friends. But mobile phones aren’t the only way that ICT is …
Webinar: Off-grid but online – ICT in the last mile Read More »
Interview with Steve Andrews, CEO, NewLight Africa (Heya!) Location: London, UK and Nairobi, Kenya “Think of us as the Amazon of rural Africa” After some time in the solar lights business, Steve Andrews asked himself what more his customers could need. He was CEO of SunnyMoney, a company owned by the NGO SolarAid, which he …
Steve Andrews, Heya: for-profit models are working for clean technologies in Africa Read More »
Interview with Mohamedrafik Parpia Founder, Zara Solar Location: Mwanza, Tanzania “I didn’t know anything about solar” A Dutch woman walks into an electronics store in north-western Tanzania. It sounds like an improbable beginning. Karlijn Arkesteijn is one of the people Mohamedrafik Parpia credits for going from running a family business on the shores of Port …
Making the market” for solar in northern Tanzania Read More »
Dr. Rahul Walawalkar, President & MD, Customized Energy Solutions India (CES) and Executive Director, India Energy Storage Alliance (IESA) Harsh Thacker, Project Manager for MICRO, the Microgrid Initiative for Campus and Rural Opportunities, Customized Energy Solutions India (CES) Location: Pune, Maharashtra, India “Learning should not be proprietary; we have to learn from each other’s mistakes” …
How will India install 10,000 micro-grids over the next five years? Read More »
[:en] Interview with Leena Chandran-Wadia Senior Fellow, Observer Research Foundation Location: Bangalore, India “The day we can say that every home is electrified is very far away” ‘Kerala is totally electrified!’ run the headlines in the Indian papers. It’s a claim many Indian villages make, says Dr. Leena Chandran-Wadia, the Senior Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation …
Leena Chandran-Wadia: Are mini-grids the answer to rural electrification? Read More »
Neha Juneja, Co-founder, Greenway Location: Mumbai, India “If you don’t experience a problem yourself, it’s not easy to solve it” There was a year in the early days of Greenway in India, where Neha Juneja and her two-co-founders were eating everything they were cooking on a traditional cookstove that each of them kept in their apartments …
Greenway: Bringing cleaner cooking to rural India Read More »
What is your off-grid energy business? Can you give a brief overview? How long have you been working on this business? Lytyfy addresses the twin issues of last mile service delivery of off grid products and end user financing. We believe that these are the two main factors that prevent adoption of off grid energy …
Profile: Vishnu Raghunathan, Lytyfy – Winner, India Read More »
What is your off-grid energy business? Can you give a brief overview? How long have you been working on this business? Lytyfy is a clean energy financing company which helps low and middle income customers to buy good quality solar products and service with flexible financing options. We are trying to increase the adoption of …
Describe an overview of your organization and highlight the vision you see way forward? Naturetech Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd. is a social enterprise building model villages based on holistic approach to rural development centered on smart solar AC micro grid infrastructure. Naturetech microgrids power village street lights, households, schools, water pumps and its grids can be …
Profile: Shyam Patra, Naturetech – Winner, India Read More »
Brief biography Arpan Mukhopadhyay is a design engineer looking into the smart metering aspects of smart village initiatives of Naturetech Infra. He is a newly passed out post graduate and is passionate about development of the weaker sections of society and protection of environment using technology. He did his M.Tech in Power Electronics and Drives …
Profile: Arpan Mukhopadhyay , Naturetech – Winner, India Read More »
The Smart Villages Initiative and the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC) held a one-day workshop focusing on “Smart Rural Development: the Sustainable Development Goals and the New European Consensus on Development” in Brussels on 20 June 2017. The New European Consensus on Development was proposed in November 2016 and the European Parliament adopted its position in February 2017. On 7 June 2017 at the …
WR37: Smart Rural Development – the SDGs and the New European Consensus on Development Read More »
Idara Bethel Etukudor is Head of Projects for SunLight Energy Ventures, a company he founded with his wife Christie. He has over 13 years professional experience in the construction industry, having previously worked as Client Representative on a Hotel, 18-Hole Golf Course and Jetty Project for the Akwa Ibom State Government; and as Project Supervisor …
Profile: Idara Bethel Etukudor, Sunlight Energy Ventures – Finalist, West Africa Read More »
Brief Biography Christie is the CEO of SunLight Energy Ventures, a solar energy social enterprise she founded with her husband. Prior to this, she held a lecturing position at Covenant University, Ota, Nigeria where she taught Renewable Energy Technologies to Final year students in the Department of Electrical and Information Engineering. She also consults on …
Profile: Christie Etukador, Sunlight Energy Ventures – Finalist, West Africa Read More »
Brief biography Dodji AGBEZO is the head of Projet Production Solaire Togo Company. He has two masters Degree. The first master in 2007 in Energy option at University of Lomé. Since training as renewable energy and energy efficiency engineer from International Institute of engineering of water and the environment (2IE), in Burkina Faso (www.2ie-edu.org) in …
Profile: Dodji Agbezo, Project Production Solaire – Finalist, West Africa Read More »
Kouma Agbenowossi is in charge of marketing for PPS (Projet production Solaire), which specializes in Renewable Energy in Togo. Kouma started working with PPS in March 2016 and has a background in negotiation, leadership education and team management. He is studying Business Administration and Leadership (ongoing) at VELI (van Duyse Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute) at Cotonou-Benin, …
Profile: Kouma Agbenowossi, Project Production Solaire – Finalist, West Africa Read More »