In a country with a perennial power crunch, the people of a tiny mountain village in Kerala have taken a huge step towards meeting their electricity needs by setting up a micro hydel power project.
Three local entrepreneurs Anil K, T J George and Samuel Thomas set up the unique and cost effective power generating unit in December last year in Pathanpara, in Kannur district, in a short span of 90 days to provide electricity to the 450 families of the village. The project went through without harming the environment or displacing local people.
At present four kilowatts kw of power is being supplied to the village. Till February, the village was getting power seven hours a day, which has declined to two hours each in the morning and evening due to the thinning of the water supply. The source of water is a running stream and a small pond that the villagers have dug.
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The tale of enterprise has impressed many, but not the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB), which seems set to play spoilsport as it is citing the rule book to declare the hydel project illegal. In the Pathanpara system, the turbine, which is the prime mover in a conventional hydel power unit, has been replaced by a centrifugal pump and the generating unit by an ordinary induction motor.
Anil, who runs a small unit manufacturing electronic chalks, expresses his gratitude to the Red Earth Foundation at Panchgani for financing his trip to Nepal to learn about micro hydel projects. The foundation also helped him to organise a seminar on the subject at which a man from Pathanpara showed an interest in getting electricity for his home.
This provided the necessary impetus to Anil and his fellow inventors one of whom, Samuel Thomas, is an engineer to develop this project. The villagers helped them generously with both manpower and money.
Shibu Ollikal, convenor of the Peoples Electricity Campaign at Pathanpara, said, 38 families contributed Rs 6,000 each and another 17 families contributed Rs 2,000 each. They also contributed more than 700 labourers.
We had full faith in Anil because he had successfully erected a plant earlier.
We just initiated it, a spokesman for the Red Earth Foundation said. Our aim is to empower people. Our foundation believes in responding to the needs of the community.
The success of this is primarily because everything was locally done and was also ecologically viable because there has been no displacement of people.
But the KSEB claims the innovation is unlawful. Going by the Indian Electricity Act only the state electricity boards have the right to distribute power.
Anil and his colleagues are hoping that the local council would take up the legal side of the venture with the KSEB. Board officials have already visited the project site twice.
Anil said, while setting up these generators we never knew that what we have done would be against the law.
Ollikal felt the government would not object to the power project even if the KSEB does. He said the system was efficient as it detected and cut the supply if anyone consumed more power than the allocated amount. Moreover, the system has not broken down even once.
Vishal Mehta, an engineer specialising in micro hydel projects said, mini and micro hydel power is being pursued at many levels. Even though all of them seem to be involved in the same work, their motives, means, approach and consequences differ. The problem of community electrification by micro hydel power is more complex than I ever perceived, but by far it is the least complicated in the technological sense as has been proved by the three men in Pathanpara.
Meanwhile, plans to generate another 10 kw are being made at Pathanpara and negotiations for funding are on with a bank. The villagers are planning to commission it by June and hope to get noted environmentalist Medha Patkar to inaugurate it.