This book offers important historical information on the state of rural electrification in the 1980s. It also summarizes the development of benefit evaluation methods, along with findings from recent research on the impact of rural electrification for development.

Douglas Barnes and his team of development experts provide an essential guide that can help improve the quality of life to the estimated 1.6 billion rural people in the world who are without electricity. The difficulties in bringing electricity to rural areas are formidable: Low population densities result in high capital and operating costs. Consumers are often poor, and their electricity consumption is low. Politicians interfere with the planning and operations of programs, insisting on favored constituents. Yet, as Barnes and his contributors demonstrate, many countries have overcome these obstacles. The Challenge of Rural Electrification provides lessons from successful programs in Bangladesh, Chile, China, Costa Rica, Mexico, the Philippines, Thailand, and Tunisia, as well as Ireland and the United States. These insights are presented in a format that should be accessible to a broad range of policymakers, development professionals, and community advocates. Barnes and his contributors do not provide a single formula for bringing electricity to rural areas. They do not recommend a specific set of institutional arrangements for the participation of public sector companies, cooperatives, and private firms. They argue instead that successful programs follow a flexible, but still well-defined set of principles: a financially viable plan that clearly accounts for any subsidies; a cooperative relationship between electricity providers and local communities; and an operational separation from day-to-day government and politics.

To maintain a healthy ecosystem for contemporary society and for future generations, policies must be implemented to protect the environment. This can be achieved by consistent evaluation of new initiatives and strategies. The Handbook of Research on Renewable Energy and Electric Resources for Sustainable Rural Development is a critical scholarly resource that examines efficient use of electric resources and renewable energy sources which have a positive impact on sustainable development. Featuring coverage on cogeneration thermal modules, photovoltaic (pv) solar, and renewable energy systems (RES) application practices, this publication is geared towards academics, practitioners, professionals, and upper-level students interested in the latest research on renewable energy and electric resources for sustainable rural development.

This book addresses the key challenges of balancing economic growth, poverty alleviation, and environmental protection in the development of major physical infrastructure, ranging from transport to energy.

Rural Electrification poses solutions to the insuperable modern challenge of providing 24/7 electricity for populations, housing and territory located outside towns and cities. The book reviews the historical development of rural energy systems, their status quo, and the role of renewable and fossil fueled solutions in delivering electricity. It addresses core issues of energy source typologies, resource deployment, fundamental challenges and limitations, the burgeoning threat of climate change, and the role of the renewable energy transition. Chapters account for almost all forms of fuel solutions, with a focus on electrification economics, planning, and policy using the most cost-effective fuels and systems available. Novel approaches to address the challenges of rural electrification, including distributed generation systems, new management and ownership models, off-grid systems, and future energy technologies are thoroughly explored. The work concludes with a comparative assessment of different energy supply technologies and scenarios, contrasting the pros and cons of fossil fuels versus renewable energy resources to achieve the goal of comprehensive rural electrification. - Provides a suite of new approaches to deliver and expand electrification across challenging rural environments - Describes optimal economics, planning and policy for electrification where there is no access to electricity - Reviews how practitioners can achieve cost reductions for rural energy supply using existing technologies - Addresses routes to power rural electrification within a transitioning energy economy while simultaneously accounting for climate change considerations

Electricity, supplied reliably and affordably, is foundational to the U.S. economy and is utterly indispensable to modern society. However, emissions resulting from many forms of electricity generation create environmental risks that could have significant negative economic, security, and human health consequences. Large-scale installation of cleaner power generation has been generally hampered because greener technologies are more expensive than the technologies that currently produce most of our power. Rather than trade affordability and reliability for low emissions, is there a way to balance all three? The Power of Change: Innovation for Development and Deployment of Increasingly Clean Energy Technologies considers how to speed up innovations that would dramatically improve the performance and lower the cost of currently available technologies while also developing new advanced cleaner energy technologies. According to this report, there is an opportunity for the United States to continue to lead in the pursuit of increasingly clean, more efficient electricity through innovation in advanced technologies. The Power of Change: Innovation for Development and Deployment of Increasingly Clean Energy Technologies makes the case that America's advantagesâ€"world-class universities and national laboratories, a vibrant private sector, and innovative states, cities, and regions that are free to experiment with a variety of public policy approachesâ€"position the United States to create and lead a new clean energy revolution. This study focuses on five paths to accelerate the market adoption of increasing clean energy and efficiency technologies: (1) expanding the portfolio of cleaner energy technology options; (2) leveraging the advantages of energy efficiency; (3) facilitating the development of increasing clean technologies, including renewables, nuclear, and cleaner fossil; (4) improving the existing technologies, systems, and infrastructure; and (5) leveling the playing field for cleaner energy technologies. The Power of Change: Innovation for Development and Deployment of Increasingly Clean Energy Technologies is a call for leadership to transform the United States energy sector in order to both mitigate the risks of greenhouse gas and other pollutants and to spur future economic growth. This study's focus on science, technology, and economic policy makes it a valuable resource to guide support that produces innovation to meet energy challenges now and for the future.

For those in developed nations, suddenly being without electricity is a disaster: power cuts have us fretting over the food stored in the freezer, and even a few hours without lights, televisions, or air conditioning is an ordeal. However, for an estimated 1.6 billion people worldwide, the absence of electricity is their daily experience. An untold number of others live with electricity that is erratic and of poor quality. How can electric power be brought into their lives when the centralized utility models that have evolved in developed nations are not an economically viable option? Poor, rural communities in developing nations cannot simply be ‘plugged in’ to a grid. Small-scale Distributed Generation (DG), ranging from individual solar home systems to village level grids run off diesel generators, could provide the answer, and this book compares around 20 DG enterprises and projects in Brazil, Cambodia and China, each of which is considered to be a "business model" for distributed rural electrification. While large, centralized power projects often rely on big subsidies, this study shows that privately run and localized solutions can be both self-sustaining and replicable. Its three sections provide a general introduction to the issue of electrification and rural development, set out the details of the case studies and compare the models involved, and discuss the important thematic issues of equity, access to capital and cost-recovery. Hisham Zerriffi shows that in each case, it is not simply a matter of matching a particular technology to a particular need. Numerous institutional factors come into play including the regulatory regime, access to financial services, and government/utility support or opposition to the DG alternative. Despite this, in many countries, the question is not whether DG has a role to play. Rather it is a question of how it will play a role.