“Now I can recharge my phone at home. I do not have to walk for hours or to pay for that.” Inhabitant, Village, Niger. This quote is taken directly off Akon Lighting Africa’s website and really underpins the energy crisis in Africa.
There is an estimated 600 million people all across rural communities in Africa who don’t have access to electricity. Consider for a moment how we feel every time there is load shedding. Not having electricity prevents us from performing the most basic tasks and the evenings are extremely uncomfortable with the lack of a working oven and no hot water. But we only experience this occasionally and for a short period of time. The energy crisis across Africa sees communities having no electricity at all which has resulted in over 3.5 million Africans dying each year due to fires or pollutants in the home.
Five-time Grammy award winner, Akon, has launched a solar energy academy that forms part of his initiative called Akon Lighting Africa.
Solar energy has been harnessed as an excellent form of alternative energy. Because of the innovative technologies that are used to harness solar energy, Akon’s initiative is to consolidate the expertise of the African people in these rural villages. Through his solar academy he hopes to train people in every aspect of the installation process and maintenance procedures of solar energy powered electric systems and micro-grids. The continent averages around 320 days of sunshine a year and Akon hopes to take full advantage of this and eventually deliver solar energy to the estimated 600 million people who currently have no access to any electricity whatsoever.
The academy will be based in Mali and is set to open this summer. To find out more about this superb initiative please have a look through their website.
Back home in SA we can look forward to 100GW of solar energy by 2030.
According to website www.htxt.co.za Norwegian solar power company Renewable Energy Corporation (REC) will be entering the renewable energy market in Africa. Specifically, REC is set to bring in high-efficiency solar panels, kit solutions and solar hybrid boxes. They have set up three offices across the continent in Kenya, Ghana and SA and will soon be opening their training facility that will train solar energy distributors and give them the means to train the local people.
The South African Solar Expo will be taking place in 2016 and REC will be in attendance where they will reveal more of their plans and progress.
The energy crisis in Africa has been flagged on an international level and is gaining momentum through a lot of airtime and investment. However, this doesn’t mean that we should sit back and leave it entirely to the professionals.
Every single one of us can do our bit to assist in battling the energy crisis. Introducing solar energy into your home is an excellent way to assist with the crisis and save on your electricity bill each month. There are other ways to save energy in your home or place of business too and you can check these out in our Guide to Green Building your Home. Sometimes it takes a small change to have a big impact and we have seen this happen through the use of window film. Window film maximises the natural lighting in your home or office which diminishes the need to turn the lights on and use electricity, it also has insulating properties which lessens the use of temperature control devices and appliances.
If you would like to find out more about doing your bit to save energy please contact us directly as with our window film product we are able to help you create an eco-friendly living space.
