DEVELOPMENT: Netherlands to Find Energy for 10 Million

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Janneke Schuurman

AMSTERDAM, Mar 15 2006 (IPS) - The Netherlands wants to provide sustainable energy to 10 million people in developing countries by 2015.

That commitment held out by Dutch development minister Agnes van Ardenne seeks to address a small part of the global problem. An estimated two billion people have no access to electricity or other modern forms of energy, and some three billion people still cook using wood or charcoal..

The Dutch ministry of foreign affairs says it has signed agreements for providing sustainable energy in developing countries with Dutch non-governmental organisations such as SNV and Novib (Oxfam Netherlands) and with companies like Free Energy which produces solar panels, Shell Solar and the energy company Nuon.

Contracts have been signed that will give 4.5 million people sustainable energy for cooking and more than 1.5 million people electricity.

Between 2000 and 2005, Shell Solar sold and installed more than 100,000 solar home systems in India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, China and Indonesia in areas where communities have access to little or no reliable grid power.

About 40,000 units were installed last year. “We want to establish local market organisations to manage the whole project, from selling and installing to after sales service,” says André Romeyn, spokesperson for Shell Netherlands. “We want to establish strong, economic organisations.”

Shell sees no good in donating or renting out systems, he says. “Experiences from the past have taught us that this doesn’t always work out in a constructive way. Donating or renting involves a problem of ownership. If no one is held really responsible for the project, it will fail.” Some projects in Latin America and Africa ran aground because of this, Romeyn says.

Power supply from such projects still depends on financial support from local governments, the Dutch ministry of foreign affairs and bank loans. “Whether projects will become profitable depends on movements in the countries involved and the possibilities to expand our activities.”

Microcredits, small loans to entrepreneurs and people with low income are essential to establish market organisations, Romeyn says. “Very often people are wealthy enough to pay for power supply, but there is lack of starting capital.”

By the end of 2004 the Dutch energy company Nuon agreed on a public private partnership (PPP) with Oxfam Netherlands and the ministry of foreign affairs for a small-scale solar energy project in Kwazulu Natal in South Africa. The project is recasting six sea containers into office units. Three of these containers, equipped with solar panels, were delivered last year. The next three will be delivered this year.

“The project is aimed at supporting new entrepreneurs and promoting sustainable development in rural areas without access to electricity grids,” says Nuon spokesperson David Uitdenbogaart. “One sea container provides accommodation to five entrepreneurs.”

Nuon also supports provision of solar panels to individuals, small companies and institutes in Mali and South Africa. These panels are meant to provide solar energy for maternity clinics, schools, and to operate water pumps.

Sustainable energy will be one of the main priorities at the 14th session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD14) to be held in New York in early May.

World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz has said that lack of electricity services is a major obstacle to doing business for as many as 25 percent of firms in Latin America, 38 percent of firms in South Asia and 44 percent of firms in sub-Saharan Africa.

An estimated 1.6 billion people, mostly living in rural areas of Africa and South Asia still have no access to electricity grids, the International Energy Agency says. In Burundi, Guinea, Malawi and Rwanda, no more than 5 percent of households have electricity.

The World Bank will double its investment in energy projects in 2006 to a total of 3 billion dollars. Van Ardenne says it is essential that these investments benefit the poor in rural areas.