Cherryflava

A possible solution to South Africa’s energy crisis?

Posted on 17. Jan, 2008 by Jonathan Cherry in Uncategorized

The electricity supply problem in South Africa, as we are all well aware, is a big one. Two hour long power cuts are as normal as high ranking political figures being arrested and it doesn’t look like being fixed any time soon.

Instead of moaning about it, there’s real opportunity here.

In Holland – a company called Qurrent is pioneering a new way of effectively working with renewable energy within suburban neighbourhoods.

Here’s how it works: Using renewable energy sources like small wind turbines and solar panels, this company develops devices, software and services that enable the creation of
small Local Energy Networks. Within these networks, which are mostly
privately owned, Qurrent members exchange energy to maximize the
efficiency of the energy they produce. Surplus energy is then sold back to the grid to subsidise the network.

A Local Energy Network is basically a mini-grid that
is connected to the utility grid through one connection. Therefore,
electricity can first be exchanged the cluster members before surplus
capacities have to be sold back to the grid. Of course, when the
cluster as a whole isn’t producing enough energy, then additional
energy will be brought in through the grid.

Sharing energy with other members optimizes the efficiency of your
system. For instance, at noon both your solar panels and wind turbines
are probably producing a lot of electricity. However, because you’re at
work, normally nobody would be using any and so the power would be sold
back to the grid. By using the subtle differences in consumption
profiles between members, surplus capacity for one member can be
filling up shortages at another member. And an hour later the situation
could be reversed.

So you and your neighbours could then end up supplying Eskom and sending them bills. Sounds too good to be true, but makes perfect sense to us.

Website: Qurrent
[via Springwise]