ENERGY-BRAZIL: ‘Democratisation’ of Hot Shower Now in Danger

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, May 29 2001 (IPS) - Government-imposed reductions in energy consumption threaten the hot shower, a custom that is widespread in Brazil, even among the poorer sectors of the populations, thanks to the low-cost ‘chuveiro elétrico’ (electric showerhead).

The Fernando Henrique Cardoso government has adopted draconian measures to force Brazil’s 160 million people to conserve 20 percent of the electricity normally consumed from June to November – an attempt to prevent blackouts in the coming months.

The households and businesses that do not comply with the energy-saving regulations could have their electricity cut off, and residential consumers will see their electrical bills skyrocket by 200 percent if they use more than 500 kilowatts a month, a low quota for those accustomed to using several household appliances run on electricity.

Another measure under consideration is a 28 to 60 percent tax hike on the industry and sales of Brazil’s electric showerheads in order to foment other sources of hot water for bathing, such as water heaters that operate on gas or solar power.

If the initiative takes effect it would mean lay-offs for half the 7,000 workers in the sector that produces the water-heating ‘chuveiro’ apparatus, and would hurt suppliers and retailers as well, warned business leaders and Paulo Pereira da Silva, president of the ‘Força Sindical’ labour union.

“I couldn’t make that kind of replacement now,” Edna Camille, a university professor from Sao Paulo, told IPS, adding that it had hardly occurred to her to exchange her electrical showerhead for some other system that uses less energy.

In Brazil, a ‘chuveiro’ can be purchased for as little as six dollars, while a gas-operated water heater costs at least 20 times that much, and involves complicated installation to ensure safety.

Camille pointed out that it would be very difficult to cut electrical consumption by 20 percent after having reduced it by more than half last year in the house she shares with her adolescent daughter.

After a blackout in early 2000, the two resolved to turn off the refrigerator, unnecessary lights, and the hot water for the dishwasher, in addition to cutting down on use of the washing machine and iron.

“The predicted water rationing in Sao Paulo will force everyone to bathe less anyway,” said the professor with irony in her voice.

Electric showerheads can be found in 25 million Brazilian households and are responsible for six or seven percent of the nation’s electricity consumption, estimates Augustin Woelz, owner of the Sao Paulo-based micro-enterprise Sunpower, and inventor of a low-cost solar heater.

His invention does not eliminate the need for the electrical showerheads, but uses them to provide complementary heat on colder or cloudy days, explained Woelz. The electric showerheads have been an important factor in “democratising the hot shower in Brazil,” he acknowledged.

It is unfair to make the ‘chuveiro’ the scapegoat of Brazil’s energy crisis, given that a shower lasts eight minutes on average, while refrigerators consume electricity all day long, argues Claudio Lorenzetti, head of the company bearing his family’s name, one of the leading producers of the apparatus.

The electric showerhead helps conserve water because it consumes a third of what is normally used by water heaters run on gas or solar energy, assures the businessman.

In Brazil, water means electricity. More than 90 percent of the energy generated in the country comes from hydroelectric plants. This dependence on the nation’s rivers has led to the current crisis.

There has been a shortage of rainfall since last year, but the fundamental cause of today’s emergency is the lack of investment in the generation and transmission of electricity in the last two decades, and especially in the last few years.

Energy consumption in Brazil has continued to outstrip the gross domestic product (GDP), due – among other factors – to the rapid urbanisation of the population, the weight of the informal economy and the expanding use of electrical appliances, especially among the poorer sectors.

From 1995 to 2000, energy consumption grew more than four percent, while the capacity for electrical production rose just three percent, according to the Institute for Strategic Development of the Electrical Sector.

To ensure energy supplies in recent years, despite the energy- GDP imbalance, the sector has been surpassing its quotas in using water from Brazil’s reservoirs to generate electricity.

The drought has punished both that risky move and the energy sector’s lack of planning, says the Institute.