In 1941 when I visited my grandparents’ small ranch about 20 miles from San Luis Obispo, they had no electricity. The nearest small town, Pozo, had no electricity. The town lit its church with kerosene lamps. The huge electrical grid that laced together our country was incomplete.
America's huge grid, generators, wires, poles, etc., was built when wood, coal, oil and metal were cheap.
In the June 26 NEW YORKER, Bill McKibben published an article on electrifying Africa today. Parts of Africa are going solar because (drum roll) solar does not need a grid. The price of solar panels is falling. Light bulbs and batteries are growing more efficient. Isolated villages can afford to generate enough power to run cell phones, lamps, fans, television, computers. Most rural areas haven’t done this yet, but it’s going to happen.
In Africa, solar is cheaper than kerosene. A company named Off-Grid sells a starter kit that costs thirteen dollars a month (for three years). It includes a solar panel, a radio, some L.E.D. lights, a battery and a phone charger. Another company might sell, even cheaper, a solar lamp, which soaks up sunlight and then glows at night.
A very popular item in rural Africa, by the way, is an electric fan. That would be my first choice.
What I wonder is what Africans will do as more and more people make connections with one another. Big unpredictable changes are coming in the next century.
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