Maximizing Solar Energy: Exploring Technologies and Resource Availability - Essay Sample

Introduction

Solar radiation refers to the electromagnetic radiation emitted by the sun. It can be captured and changed into useful energy forms. The solar resource is one of the forms of energy that is friendly to the environment. This is achieved through a variety of technologies (Samad et al., 2019). However, the economic operation and the technical feasibility of the technologies involved at particular locations depend on solar resource availability. The amount of solar radiation varies depending on the season, time of the day, geographical location, local weather, and landscape. At least 80% of the Bangladesh population lives in rural areas that do not access electricity (Huq et al., 2019).

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The data on the average sunshine in Bangladesh indicates that the coastal regions receive bright sunshine for 3 to 11 hours daily. The average insolation is 5 kWh/m2/day. This is an indication that the prospects for photovoltaic and solar applications are good. An average of 40% of the population in Bangladesh does not have access to electricity. When the government realized the problem, it introduced a scheme commonly known as the Home Systems (H.S.). The project has become one of the success stories when there is a partnership between the private sector and the government of Bangladesh (Huq et al., 2019). The scheme aimed to provide electricity to homes that cannot access the grid. As of 2014, the programmed had reached three million homes, and more than 50,000 were added every month (Samad et al., 2019). When the World Bank assessed the project, it concluded that it is the fastest-growing home solar system in the world. The government of Bangladesh is working towards making the country have universal electricity access by the year 2021. With the scheme in place, the government believes that every home can have access to electricity by 2021(Wang, 2012). The international and local partners cooperated with the International Development Company to install the solar home systems in the country's remote areas. These were areas that would not access the national electricity grid (Khandker & World Bank, 2014). The project aimed to provide basic coverage of electricity for the improvement of the standard of lives of the people who live in regions.

Most of the efforts in the electrification of Bangladesh have been focusing on the expansion of the grid, not paying much attention to the solar resources that are cheaper and easier to install. They are also viable because of the dispersed settlements in the rural areas, making it challenging to implement the national grid projects in the regions. The main challenges that the government has been facing in ensuring that every household is benefiting from solar resources can be primarily be described as a performance gap. The government should learn from the mistakes made earlier when implementing the Solar Home Systems and develop a strategy that will ensure that the project does not stall (Wang,2012). Enough funds should be secured, and there should be citizen participation so that when the policies are formulated, they will feel part and parcel of it, and therefore, they will embrace it. When disbursing the loans for installing the solar system, they should come up with friendly policies on the payment of installments so that they are not burdened to a level where they will not be able to pay and, therefore, default (Swarnakar, 2017). There should be proper capacity building so that there is enough technical knowledge in the installation and operation of the solar systems.

To ensure that the solar energy is equitably shared the government should do away with the fee for service model which was used during the implementation of the S.H.S. In this model, an energy service company (ESCO) was selling the S.H.S at a fee to the consumer.ESCO maintains the ownership of the gadget, installed, maintained, and replaced the components at a charge. The government should look for ways to do away with the fee, which is paid monthly because most of the rural populations cannot afford it. They should also be allowed to own the solar panels and their components. There also be thorough consultative meetings with the stakeholders so that the program can move on smoothly when the citizens feel that they are part of the project (Sheik& Yash, 2020). The government should also be fully committed to the program.

The loans that are extended to families have a short payback period. Bearing in mind that these are low-income families, the short period of repaying the loan has been one of the hindrances of the success of the project. Payback time refers to the period it takes to recover the money that is lent to an individual. Though the project has been a success, it is on the blink of being abandoned hence leaving other people in the country unable to enjoy the fruits of solar radiation. The problems the scheme has faced include the huge default amounts that the customers re owed. This has been attributed to some problems, such as poor coordination amongst the various government agencies involved in the project. There are also other problems, such as the weak financial systems of governance (Rashid & Zhang, 2019). Additionally, there have been challenges in trying to commercialize the program to gain some good income from the local partners involved.

Application of Ecological Economics in Bangladesh

The explanation about the EKC curve is rightly applicable in Bangladesh. The country is achieving its economic growth at the expense of the environment. The government seems to be convinced that the economy's growth comes first, and other things, such as taking care of the environment, are secondary. The argument is real because any country's macroeconomic growth is an essential condition for any development. However, every action taken has a price in economics, which is called opportunity cost in the discipline. Growing an economy of a region or a country comes with a price, which is environmental degradation. Environmental degradation has got its socioeconomic implications, which the government of Bangladesh should not ignore. The economy of a country and the environment are not mutually inclusive (Whyte et al., 2019). If one looks at the two from the short-term perspective, they appear as disjointed; however, from the long-term perspective, the two are closely related.

The government needs to realize that for any sensible economic growth to be sustained, the environment should be conserved; otherwise, the citizens will face dire repercussions. The environmental degradation observed in Bangladesh has affected the health of its citizens, which has ultimately affected the well-being of some of the country's population. Therefore, the two are like the two sides of the same coin. Hence, they should be allowed to move together because if the citizens are healthy, they will help in the country's development. A good number of people in Bangladesh depend on the environment for survival. This ranges from forestry, farming, fishing, and horticulture. Therefore, if the environment is destroyed, some people's livelihood is also affected, which will affect the country's economic growth (Wang et al., 2012). These are some of the lessons that the policymakers and the politicians in Bangladesh should be aware of before making decisions that affect the environment.

In Bangladesh, the awareness of the environment has never been part of what the students learn at schools and colleges, thus making most people lack knowledge about it. This lack of knowledge leads to them not taking care of it (Swarnakar et al., 2017). The reckless environmental degradation in Bangladesh includes the careless cutting of trees, the destruction of the wetlands, unregulated disposal of wastes that is hazardous the emission of harmful particles into the air, polluting water, and the destruction of the wetlands. The natural resources are overexploited, leading to a situation where the economic benefits do not match the environmental degradation because the environment is highly polluted or destroyed. Bangladesh can prevent this by channeling some of the funds obtained from the trade to improve the environment (Whyte et al., 2019). The country should set a certain percentage of its budget towards the improvement of the environment.

Environmental degradation in Bangladesh has had long-term effects on its economy. The effects include the loss of arable land, the destruction of property, and loss of lives due to the extreme weather conditions. Others include increased cost of healthcare and the decline in the quality of life. According to studies, Bangladesh is expected to be one of the worst affected countries globally in climate change courtesy of its negligible contribution towards eradicating the catastrophe. The destruction of the environment has led to economic injustice. Most of the people in the country who suffer from the adverse effects of pollution are not the rich who contribute to it but the poor. The affluent in the country enjoy modern social amenities, while the poor are languishing in poverty (Whyte et al., 2019). These amenities, such as cars and other electronic devices, lead to the pollution of the environment, which affects the poor because the wastes find their way into the water bodies and other empty spaces used by the poor.

Lessons Learned

The country has been addressing the issues facing its citizens, such as the productivity levels and the low living standards of its people. It has also been prepared to address the environmental, social, and economic pressure. For the last three decades, the government of Bangladesh has been experiencing a rising Gross Domestic Percapita (G.D.P.). Its continued economic growth has played a significant role in solving its environmental problems. In Bangladesh, there is a close connection between the growth of the economy and the preservation of the environment (Sheik& Yash, 2020). When the economy of a country slows down, it might not be an excellent position to work on the conservation of the environment.

Most of the mainstream economists are relatively confident that when a country has sustained economic growth, it is the pathway of achieving environmental improvement. However, if the economy's growth declines, it will not meet its obligations to improve the environment (Momotaj et al., 2020). Therefore, the state of its environment will decline. However, this is not the case in Bangladesh regarding environmental conservation because it had deteriorated irrespective of the booming economy. This shows that it is not only the economy that determines the state of the environment, but, the policies and strategies formulated by the stakeholders on how to conserve the environment(Younus, 2014). In developed economies, the economy's growth goes in tandem with the improvement of the environment (Sheik& Yash, 2020). The case is different in developing countries such as Bangladesh. The economic growth of Bangladesh has heavily relied on the conventional path of encouraging the accumulation of capital and putting weak conditions on transforming natural resources as well as environmental assets into human-made capital (Whyte et al., 2019). As the country increases its income per capita, it should make more potent its conditions to sustain its long-term economic growth.

Bangladesh is one of the countries in Asia that is adversely affected by environmental risks and pollution. The country has come up with strategies of making it an upper-middle-income country, and therefore, it must act prudently to tackle the problem of pollution and environmental degradation. This should happen more, especially in the cities (Whyte et al., 2019). The Country Environmen...