Clean energy is the way

Check out this stark contrast. In the developed west, people are used to mood lighting,microwave ovens and fast-freeze ice makers, allergy-reducing vacuum cleaners to high-speed broadband connected computers in their homes. And now they are realising the environmental costs of such comforts and looking for new alternatives. In sub-Saharan Africa, just 8% of the rural population has access to electricity. About a quarter of the world's population, particularly those in rural parts of the developing world do not have access to electricity in their homes.

Can the former expect the latter to forego the comforts? But without a change, the planet's climate is headed for a disastrous end. Even to secure temperature reductions in the second half of the century, a rapid transition to clean energy needs to begin immediately. Achieving substantial reductions in temperatures relative to the coal-based system will take the better part of a century, and will depend on rapid and massive deployment of some mix of conservation, wind, solar, and nuclear, and possibly carbon capture and storage.

Benedict Ilozor and Mohammed Kama of the Eastern Michigan University, in Ypsilanti, USA, suggest that renewable energy is a viable option for electrical power in developing and emerging nations. Writing in the inaugural issue of the African Journal of Economic and Sustainable Development, they point out that in most of these nations, the demand for energy far exceeds the generating capacity. They suggests that a rapid response to this huge demand that is informed by social, political, economic, climatic and environmental factors must be put in place so that renewable, sustainable energy supply can be identified.

They suggest that cost is the limiting factor and that communities and governments would be unable to subsidize neither the one-time installation costs nor the ongoing maintenance however low, for most renewable energy solutions. It is, hence up to the private sector and commercial banks, and perhaps charitable organizations, to pitch in.

There are many approaches to solar power, for instance, that could be implemented by individual households or small communities for domestic electricity as well as on a larger scale, while geothermal systems could be run to provide the power for cooling.

Decentralised energy and a mix of locally available energy sources hold the solution to the energy security, climate chage tangle.