Solar Light Improves Lives of India’s Urban Poor

Ted Swagerty | November 11, 2013 12:30 pm 

One of the major consequences of industrial agriculture is the steady flight of rural populations to urban centers. Economists have widely encouraged this mass movement of people as a sign of a developing economies “specializing.”

We are seeing this trend in all majors cities in Latin America, Asia and Africa. Young men and women leave their villages and move to the city in search of better wages and lifestyle. Unfortunately, the promise of a better livelihood often fails to materialize. Villagers are forced to live permanently in tent cities that are scattered across the city with little or no access to water or electricity. Meals are generally cooked inside the tent using open fires that cause respiratory problems for women and children.

Bangalore is no exception to the effects of a globalized economy, but there is an organization working hard to make life in the tent communities a little brighter:Pollinate Energy.

Pollinate Energy is a social enterprise working with Bangalore’s migrant “tent city” communities selling small, efficient solar panels (10×20 cm) that power LED room lamps that can also charge mobile phones.

India Seeks $500 Million Loan For World’s Largest Solar Array

Brandon Baker | February 11, 2014 8:33 am 

Photo credit: Solar Energy Corp. of India

India could become home to the largest solar array on the planet, but it will take more than $4 billion.

The country made the initial step this week to request a $500 million World Bank loan to help finance the first phase of a solar plant in Rajasthan that would produce 4 gigawatts (GW) of energy. India’s department of economic affairs is evaluating the proposal, according to Indian business magazine, domain-b.com. If approved, the World Bank would then consider loaning $500 million of the project’s $750 million first phase.

Six Indian companies have created a joint venture for the project. They believe the country has the potential to deliver a nearly unfathomable 5,000 trillion kilowatt hours of solar energy.

New Prime Minister Modi: Solar Energy for Every Indian Home by 2019

Brandon Baker | May 21, 2014 11:55 am 

India installed 1 gigawatt (GW) of solar energy in 2013, and now has much bigger goals for the next five years.

Administration members under newly elected Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that he wants to bring solar energy to every home in the country by 2019. India trails only China in terms of largest populations on the planet.

There are about 400 million people in India without power. That’s more than the combined populations of the U.S. and Canada.

How Solar Panels Could Transform Parking Lots and Roadways Around the World

Brandon Baker | April 28, 2014 4:57 pm 

Are roads and parking lots covered with solar panels that feed power back into the grid actually feasible or does it sound like a green-energy fairy tale?

It’s been about eight years since an electrical engineer and his counselor set out to show that updating our traveling infrastructure with renewable energy is more than a fantasy. Now, they’re on the precipice of releasing their prototype for Solar Roadways, a system that would replace asphalt on our roads, giving them an energy production purpose.

With built-in LED lights, materials sturdy enough for vehicles and heat that would prevent the buildup of excess snow and ice, Solar Roadways is an ambitious project, to be sure. But Scott and Julie Brusaw have believers in the federal government—they have received two phases of funding from the U.S. Federal Highway Administration for research and development, including $100,000 in 2009.

Despite the polls, India still isn’t confronting corruption

With neither the ruling Congress party nor the principal opposition BJP doing anything substantial to weed out this endemic malaise, it is the Aam Aadmi Party — the latest entrant in the political arena — that is expected to be the watchdog in the nation’s fight against graft

• By Laurence Cockcroft
• Published: 20:00 May 7, 2014

• Image Credit: Ramachandra Babu/©Gulf News

In the bear pit of India’s election, voters seem particularly focused on two issues: Economic growth and corruption. However, while growth manifests itself in many different ways, some of them hard for the average voter to comprehend, corruption is a tangible and daily reality. Corruption has played an important part in Indian electoral politics in the past. As early as 1977 and 1989, voters selected the winning parties in national elections in part because they pledged to fight corruption. But public concern about corruption in the run-up to this year’s election has reached a new high.

The current wave of concern found its first outlet in the 2012 campaign for an anti-corruption body with investigative powers (a Lokpal), which was led by Anna Hazare, a civil rights activist in the Gandhian tradition. His hunger strike in support of the Lokpal led to its adoption by parliament in December 2013, albeit in a diluted form. Meanwhile, over the past year, some key players in India’s political and business elite — the sort of people who normally benefit from a widespread culture of impunity — have been found guilty on corruption-related charges and imprisoned, including A. Raja (former minister of telecommunications), B.S. Yeddyurappa (former chief minister of Karnataka) and Jaganmohan Reddy (YSR Congress chief in Andra Pradesh state).

Even the chairman of the all-powerful Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), Narayanaswami Srinivasan, has been implicated in match-fixing scandals. Last month, the Supreme Court required Srinivasan to resign his position. At the same time, under the Right to Information Act of 2005, thousands of applicants have been requesting information on corruption-related issues and pointing fingers at many officials, especially at the state level. (In some cases, those information requests have led to the assassination of those making the applications). At the local level, very successful “right to know” and anti-corruption campaigns — such as the Public Affairs Centre and Janaargha (sponsors of the website “I Paid a Bribe,” which has had two million hits since it was launched four years ago) in Bengaluru — have raised awareness of citizens’ rights to a new level.