Focus on Poverty: We can create solar nations
▻http://www.scidev.net/global/energy/analysis-blog/focus-on-poverty-we-can-create-solar-nations.html
Solar power makes sense — if you can get it right. For many isolated rural communities, off-grid solutions are the best chance of accessing electricity. We assume too readily that such solutions have to be small-scale and expensive. Two major national projects from different world regions suggest this doesn’t have to be the case.
Peru recently announced a programme to supply solar power to two million of its six million people without access to electricity. The emphasis will be on poor rural areas, and the solar programme will contribute to the overall target of providing electricity to 95 per cent of Peru’s population of 30 million by 2016, up from 66 per cent now. [1]
The World Bank considers Peru to be “a country committed to poverty reduction and shared prosperity”, [2] but there is a major gap between urban and rural poverty rates — 18 and 56 per cent respectively. [3]