Article on how to the light of modernity to rural india
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BANGALORE, INDIA — As dusk falls, the sound of children singing fills the air at the SOS Tibetan Children’s Village in Bylakuppe, five hours’ drive from Bangalore in southern India. Night descends on the tidy, stone-paved school campus carved out of the lush jungle.
But darkness is dispelled when 20 solar-powered street lights on the campus begin to glow with a steady white light. Thirty dormitories set among groves of coconut palm trees are also equipped with solar lights — as is a nearby Buddhist monastery. They allow 1,000 children to study, eat and play during evening power cuts that frequently disrupt the refugee-village school’s electricity supply.
Selco, a solar energy company, installed the lights in 2003. Since its founding in 1995, Selco, based in Bangalore, India’s technology hub, has provided 100,000 homes with solar lighting systems, mostly in the surrounding state of Karnataka.
In the nearby village of Doddhosur, about 30 minutes’ drive from the Tibetan school, D.S. Shivanna, a farmer, has light bulbs in five rooms of his home that are powered by a rooftop solar panel set up by Selco last year.
Doddhosur, reached by a dirt road that runs between fields of tall corn, has electricity — but power failures are common here too
“There was no current at night,” said Varshitha Shivanna, 15, who lives in the house with her grandparents. During evening power cuts, she used to rely on candles. But now, with solar light, “we can write till how much time we want. We are writing homeworks till 11.”
About 70 percent of Selco’s customers live in remote areas that, unlike Bylakuppe and Doddhosur, have no electricity at all. Without power, they depend on candles and kerosene lamps for lighting. About 400 million Indians lack reliable electricity, living in a world apart from the bright offices and air-conditioned shopping malls of India’s cities.
A two-light Selco home system typically costs 8,500 to 11,000 rupees, or $180 to $235 — no small sum when 60 percent of the company’s customers earn 3,500 to 4,000 rupees a month. But Selco works with a variety of local rural banks to help 85 percent of its customers get financing. The on-time repayment rate for its solar loans is 90 percent, said Harish Hande, its co-founder and managing director.
Selco’s efforts are one example of India’s broader push for solar energy. Alternative energy, like wind, biomass and solar, accounts for less than 8 percent of India’s power generation. Yet the need for more clean energy in India is urgent.