Innovation

El poder de las minirredes eléctricas

Jun 2, 2017 Strive Masiyiwa and Richard Branson

HARARE – A pesar del impresionante desarrollo económico de los últimos años, África sigue muy rezagada en materia de energía: casi dos de cada tres ciudadanos del continente carecen de acceso a la electricidad. Subsanar este faltante es una meta importante, pero el tendido de redes es un proceso costoso y lento, y los generadores de electricidad independientes de la red no siempre bastan para cubrir las necesidades de energía de los usuarios. Felizmente, hay una tercera posibilidad que puede ayudar a resolver el problema: las minirredes.

Las minirredes son, básicamente, redes localizadas que suministran electricidad a varios usuarios (residenciales o comerciales), y que pueden o no estar conectadas a la red general. Como muestra un nuevo informe del Africa Progress Panel (del que uno de los autores es miembro), y reafirma otro informe del Rocky Mountain Institute, las minirredes pueden ser una parte importante de la solución a los problemas energéticos de África.

Las minirredes tienen una gran ventaja competitiva en relación con el tendido de redes en áreas rurales y alejadas, porque su implementación es más rápida y menos costosa. Como demandan menos inversión de capital que la ampliación de redes, son más fáciles de financiar y permiten electrificar en menos tiempo comunidades que normalmente deberían esperar años a que llegue la red general.

To continue reading, register now.

Subscribe now for unlimited access to everything PS has to offer.

As a registered user, you can enjoy more PS content every month – for free.

Already have an account? Log in

Subscribe to PS Digital

Access every new PS commentary, our entire On Point suite of subscriber-exclusive content – including Longer Reads, Insider Interviews, Big Picture/Big Question, and Say More – and the full PS archive.

Subscribe Now

Strive Masiyiwa

Writing for PS since 2014
4 Commentaries

Strive Masiyiwa is African Union Special Envoy on COVID-19 and Head of the African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team.

Richard Branson

Writing for PS since 2017
1 Commentary

Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, is an investor and philanthropist.

new comment has been posted. new comments have been posted.

0 Comments on this paragraph, 2 Comments on this article

John Brian Shannon Jul 19, 2017

Hi Strive and Richard,

One of the richest targets for enemies of Western nations is their hyper-vulnerable transmission corridors where hundreds of thousands of miles of power lines and pylons criss-cross every region and state on the continent.

During the Cold War, national grids were prime targets for foreign fighter-bomber jets and for small (non-nuclear) cruise missiles.

A few well-placed shots and a country could be in crisis for months, and during the cold winter months in northern states, or in the middle of the hot summer in southern states -- could cause a healthcare crisis for millions of people.

Today, the greatest threat to national grids comes from hackers, who can do far more damage to a national grid than a fleet of fighter-bomber jets.

Suffice it to say that national grids, and in particular, transmission corridors, are prime targets for the enemies of any nation, and they are incredibly vulnerable.

The time of the 'national grid' is well past, but we are slow to make the changeover.

Each city -- whether in the developing world, or in developed nations -- should have its own mini-grid, its own tailored renewable energy+efficiency+natural gas generation mix (you need natural gas to cover intermittency of renewables like at night when the Sun doesn't shine and during the times that the wind doesn't blow) or you need a very large battery system, such as TESLA is installing in South Australia:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-07/sa-to-get-worlds-biggest-lithium-ion-battery/8687268

It's not only developing nations that need to start building mini-grids and micro-grids, but our ultra-vulnerable national grids in developed nations are huge and largely unprotected targets, due to the vast swathes of land the power lines and pylons cover.

Reinvent Fire: Change Energy Use Forever
“By investing $4.5 trillion we can save $9.5 trillion and make our energy problems history.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lT-g__695Go

In some developing nations, infrastructure security is limited to cities, so a national electrical grid is completely out of the question anyway, and will remain so for some time.

Might as well spend the time and effort to do it right the first time by building mini-grids suitable for each city, each town, and each rural region of every developing country.

Sendai, Japan made a small but important contribution to prove the merits of microgrids some years ago and it continues to work well for them:

http://kleef.asia/blog/2014/04/28/smart-microgrids-plug-play/

And in the U.S. microgrids are set to become a $1 billion business by 2020:

https://jbsnews.com/2015/11/03/microgrids-1-billion-biz-2020/

Mini-grids and microgrids can solve all energy problems and increase the energy security for all nations, including developed nations!

Thank you for posting your fine essay here at ProSyn! A great read.

As always, very best regards, JBS
A new reply to this comment has been posted.
William church Jun 7, 2017

Anyone who has worked in the developing world knows immediately the huge problems with this idea. First, wind needs constant management. I think the author thinks you just put up a turbine and get electricity. That is absurd. Solar also needs management and maintenance. When we built water systems in villages we learned we also need to build a supply of parts and maintenance. This is why we build GRID. It is just that simple. Also who is going to manage the SCADA system. Will be that done centrally. I could go on and on. Great idea but by the time you put it all together you might as well as built a hybrid system of mini-grid controlled by a central authority with a grid as base power. The real problem is not transmission. So build the lines. It is building large enough base power. In this way MINI works maybe
A new reply to this comment has been posted.

https://prosyn.org/R3Bv8Rwes

El poder de las minirredes eléctricas

Subscribe to PS Digital

New Comment

Email this piece to a friend

Contact us

Log in/Register

El poder de las minirredes eléctricas

Subscribe to PS Digital

Edit Newsletter Preferences

Set up Notification