4. What are our electricity choices?
Ocean Uneconomic Seasonal, expensive and move to different
places with the different monsoons
Currents
Ocean Uneconomic Unproved, expensive, and may never work
Thermal
Biomass $0.20cts/kWh Proved, simple, sustainable, 24 hrs/day, long
term fuel contracts available at fixed price.
Wind $0.18 ‐ Unreliable, seasonal, needs massive backup or
$0.25cts/kWh storage when used alone. No good data.
Solar $0.20cts/kWh Daytime only, slightly seasonal, small storage
requirement
5. Biomass for Malé
• Fuel Cost – 50% of diesel
• Contract – fixed price 7 years
• Sustainability – high with care
• Reliability – high
40MW Malé power station
saves $25M/yr. in foreign
exchange
6. Outer Islands ‐ Wind or Solar?
Intermittent Renewables
24
G1 O u
a 3 u t
i
a3 tp kW
16. 0
14. 4
•Wind
12. 8
u y 18 11. 2
HD
o a
9. 6
of
8. 0
r
12 6. 4
4. 8
3. 2
6
1. 6
0. 0
0
Ja n Fe b M ar Ap r May Ju n Ju l Au g Sep Oct No v De c
•Solar
– Choosing the cheapest first can cause real problems
•Batteries – very expensive
– Night time electricity 2.5x cost of daytime electricity
12. Solutions
• Drive down night time consumption
– Street lights
– Fridges
– Air conditioners
– Equipment left on unnecessarily
• Cold water storage
– Oxford University Collaboration
• BETTER BATTERIES
– Ultra‐capacitors