German company Munich RE is looking to raise funds for a project that would power Europe through solar energy generated in the Sahara desert.
Apparently some think it is not a good idea to place solar panels in a potentially unstable part of the world. I would think, however, that the infrastructure would not be as heavy, need as many personnel, and be cheaper to maintain.
Not to mention that most hydrocarbons, with their huge infrastructures, come from unstable or potentially unstable parts of the world. Algeria provided 15% of Europe's gas imports in 2008, and it is more reliable than Russia, which supplied 40% of all gas imports to Europe in 2008.
Tunisia is a rather stable country, and AQ in Libya has been totally unable to establish an effective organization there.
I don't know enough about the technical aspects of this or what the costs of the equipment, infrastructure and maintenance would be. However it still seems like a good idea to me.
2 comments:
Wouldn't it be a better idea to use solar panels in the Sahara to power countries in Africa?
Let us, in the West, reduce our energy consumption to realistic levels before manipulating those less fortunate than us in order to keep our "competitive advantage" over them in the "free market."
I would agree. Much more focus needs to be put on decreasing energy consumption.
Solar power is being used to power schools and other facilities that cannot be connected to a reliable public power grid in Africa. I don't know how feasible scaling these up would be, and a lot of infrastructure would be required to send the energy back down south. I doubt most of those governments would invest in such infrastructure however, especially right now.
It may be left up to private-sector MNCs to make such investments to enhance their own energy security and security in the communities in which they operate. Not that that's an ideal solution.
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