[PHNOM PENH POST]
Cambodia's biggest solar power initiative to date – expected to provide
electricity to 12,000 households in off-grid areas – will be completed
on January 31, according to officials involved with the project.
Yiang
Tal, chief of administration at the Rural Electrification Fund, said
more than 10,000 of a total of 12,000 solar home systems had already
been installed in Ratanakiri, Preah Vihear, Siem Reap and four other
provinces as part of a World Bank-funded project.
Some villagers are already using their newly installed panels.
Em
Vanntha, a resident of Samrong village, in Pursat province, said he
signed up for the program two months ago and had a 50-watt panel
installed in his home in December. Previously, he relied on batteries
for electricity.
Em Vanntha said the US$5 a month he now paid
for his solar home system was less than he paid to regularly recharge
old batteries or buy new batteries.
“I think I have to pay about 700 or 800 riel [US$0.17 to $0.20] a day, so it is affordable,” he said.
About
43 per cent of Cambodia is covered by licensed power suppliers and
licenses are pending for an additional 18 per cent of the country,
according to the Electricity Authority of Cambodia.
This still
leaves almost 40 per cent of the nation off the electricity grid, but
officials say the solar project is a way to reach these areas.
“The
solar home system provides access to clean power and complementary
electricity services to rural households that could not be commercially
connected by the grid, through off-grid options based on renewable
energy resources,” World Bank senior operations officer Veasna Bun wrote
in an email.
Although the total cost of the 30- and 50-watt
panels is about $260 and $330 per unit respectively, a $100 subsidy as
part of the World Bank loan drops the sale price for beneficiaries to
about $160 and $230 per unit, according to Veasna Bun.
Customers
will have four years to pay off the panel costs, and they will pay
about $4.80 a month and $3.30 a month for 50- and 30-watt panels,
respectively, according to REF’s Yiang Tal.
Soun Sun, a villager
from Preah Vihear province, signed up for a 50-watt solar panel after
his parents bought one from a private company more than a year ago. He
said they had never had a problem.
“I saw my parents using solar power, and I saw that it is not difficult,” Soun Sun said.
Laos-based
firm Sunlabob had won the contract bid for the project and had supplied
materials and overseen installation over the past three months, Yiang
Tal said, adding that the total cost of purchasing the panels was $4
million.
Compared to its closest neighbours, Cambodia’s
solar-energy potential was huge, Sunlabob chief executive Andy Schroeter
said, primarily because there were few other options for alternative
energy.
Whereas Laos had hydropower and Vietnam had wind-power
potential, Schroeter said, “Cambodia has none of these resources
available. Solar [power] has huge potential in Cambodia, especially for
remote areas.”
The current project was part of the government’s
broader plan to provide all households with access to electricity by
2030, Yiang Tal said.
“We’ve implemented only the first phase in
these seven provinces,” he said. “We will continue to implement this
project, and are looking for funding.”
Schroeter said Sunlabob
was in talks with the government to continue developing solar energy
beyond household units, possibly expanding to the construction of
centralised systems in remote areas that households could connect to.
It
is also looking at a larger-scale solar plant that would allow Sunlabob
to sell energy to the state power company Electricite du Cambodge.
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