AEIC

Afghanistan – A Rapid Response to Small Scale Community Infrastructure

Participants

Empower Consultants Ltd

A New Zealand based development consultancy that has specialized in community scale infrastructure and sustainable local management structures for long term project success. Empower had the idea for this project, essentially by combining water treatment systems successfully deployed in Nepal, with wind and solar experience gathered from projects in the neighboring Pakistan province of Balochistan. Empower had worked in Pakistan since 1996 and had visited Kabul during the Taliban time in 1999 so was not unfamiliar with the area.

New Zealand Government

Were receptive to the idea and agreed to make a special case for funding the project after receiving the proposal from Empower.

The Afghan Ministry of Rural Reconstruction and Development

Agreed to provide their engineers and support staff to support the project on the ground. A very professional and enthusiastic team resides within MRRD and have been a lot of fun to work with. The provide both female health educators and water and sanitation engineers to in turn train village level operators.

UNICEF

Provide a degree of higher level international project scrutiny and support when the NZ team are out of Afghanistan.

Purpose

Afghanistan’s power and water infrastructure is literately in ruins. The water that is drunk comes from wells and open streams more than 90% of which are contaminated to one degree or another. There is very little sanitation services so human and animal waste just runs back into the streams for the next village to consume, or dries and blows as dust into the wells and everywhere else. There is also a paucity of education into why sanitation is important and about hygiene in general.

Improving water quality can make a dramatic improvement. In my opinion, it is a Western myth that developing country people get immune to drinking contaminated water. They do not ‘get used to it’ as much as they get used to being sick. Perhaps a degree of tolerance is developed but overall they do get sick like everyone else.

Implementation

Empower has worked in Nepal to install solar and micro hydro powered ozone based water treatment systems around the Annapurna Circuit. These have proved technically robust, easy to operate and maintain, have significantly reduce plastic litter from disposable bottles and improved local health stats. Simultaneously they have created successful small businesses for local Mothers Groups to own operate and use profits for their own development agenda.

Empower successfully requested funding from the NZ government and set about working with the Afghan Ministry of Rural Reconstruction to develop a team of local engineers and social mobilizer/health educators who could travel to remote communities and train/install/commission the small water treatment units. Empower first undertook a training needs assessment and site identification visit to Afghanistan in September 2002. Preliminary training on the first of the 11 units supplied was done at that time.

Once the equipment had been purchased and shipped, Empower again returned to Afghanistan to assist with the first 5 field installations. These included wind and solar installations. MRRD would first visit the site with female health educators and social mobilizers who would undertake a basic baseline data survey of the individual households in the community and also provide water and sanitation education to the household women at the same time.

Location

11 stand alone systems have been installed. They include villages in the districts of Parwan, Wardak and Kapisa. These communities are home to thousands of refugees returning home from Pakistan and Iran, following the demise of the Taliban regime.

The first wind turbine is installed in Parwan and the second will be installed in Kapisa by the time this article is published. Installation was simple and the first was supervised by Empower while the second is done independently, with a review to be done next month. One water treatment installation was also done in a Kabul high school to provide clean water to the school and community residents. It has proved very popular.

Equipment

The power system consists of a Bergey XL.1 1 kW wind turbine on a 42 ft tilt-up tower, 280 W of PV, a small battery bank, and an inverter. The water treatment technology used is small scale ozonation system. It is developed in New Zealand and uses around 160 watts of power to generate 2 grams per hour of ozone. Treatment is done on a batch basis and lots of 500 liters are treated and dispensed at a time. Ozone is very effective and uses minimal amounts of energy. It is highly effective against waterborne disease. Most communities are using the system to treat around 2000 to 4000 liters of treated drinking water per day.

Source: http://www.bergey.com

American Wind & Solar Hybrid Power Systems can Electrify an Afghan Village in 4 Hours

Rural Energy Programs by Donor

USAID

Wind measurement
Micro-hydro assessment
Rehab hydro < 5MW
Develop RE strategy
Aybak 's rural?

US Army (PRT)

Panshjir Valley 30 kW wind project

World Bank

Funded access to energy study

ADB

2007 pre-feasibility study, develop strategy policy for MEW
Focus away from grid projects to mini-hydro
Wind measurement

UNIOM

IOM Start rural electrification Project under ATI

(Afghanistan Transition Initiative) From 2002-2005
ATI Rural Electrification project is closed

IOM / ATI rural electrification the only projects are:
Rehabilitation of Dara Baddel Shalkhil Micro hydro Plant 3.5Km NW of Kabul
Building 6 kW Micro hydro power plant at De karkot Kabul
Rehabilitation of water mill sties into Micro hydro power plant Kabul, Istalif
Rehabilitation of DeMazer-e-Mitalm North west of istalif Kabul
Electrical upgrade for Pol-e-Charkhi Village, Kabul
Rehabilitation of 20 water – Millis Micro hydro Plant in 5 province from 25/Sep/004 to 30/March /2005
Power poles Installation and electrical suppliers Loya Wala in Kandahar

Germany

KfW: Chak-e-Wardak 3 MW rehab

GtZ: Was funding MEW renewable dept., solar lamp project, information centers, now no longer?
CIM: “prepared” 29 micro-hyrdro

India

Selma
Bamian micro-hydro

France

Geres: energy efficiency targeting rural, poor, medical clinincs

Korea

Mini-hydro

Japan

Mini-hydro

GOA:MEW

Has department of renewable energy

MRRD

NSP installed 208 MW rural distributed power, approximately 27,000 projects in time period 200X – 200X, now doing ________
NRVA survey every several years including access to energy

PRIVATE COMPANIES

Dealers of solar panels, solar-powered equipment, pumping, see ETC-POWER example attached
Small wind equipment dealers
Micro-hydro equipment dealers

Electrical Power and other source of energy

Electrification is a key factor for the development of all sectors of the economy. The national access to electricity from various sources is 23%.

Households that have access to any type of electrical power at some time during the year

Categories	% households	No. weighted observations
Kuchi	4	6,882
Rural	13	400,445
Urban	74	478,612
National	23	885,939

Overall provincial findings show that the highest access to electrical power is reported by households in Nuristan (62%), Kabul (61%), Balkh (49%), Jawzjan (42%)
and Kunarha (41%). The lowest access to electricity across the country was reported in households in Badghis (0%), Badakhshan and Zabul (1%) and Ghor (3%). Rural provincial data shows that rural households in Nuristan (62%), Kunarha (41%), Ghazni (39%) and Nimroz (38%) have the highest access to electrical power. In contrast, households in Badghis (0%), Zabul and Badakhshan (1%), Kandahar (2%) and Takhar (3%) reported the lowest access of electricity from any source. Most of the urban households in Jawzjan (99%), Balkh (95%), Kandahar (85%), Nangarhar (83%), Hirat (74%), Kabul (71%), Baghlan (65%), Faryab and Kunduz (64%) have access to electrical power but in Takhar only 16% have access to electrical power. Figures for access to electrical power do not necessarily represent the degree of reliability of the availability of this service. Reliability of services can be measured as the number of uninterrupted hours of service during an average day.

Public Supply Grid

The national access to public supply grid is 14%. Urban households reported highest access to public supply grid (66%). Rural and Kuchi households have low access to public supply grid, with 4% and 2%, respectively.

Categories	% households	No. weighted observations
Kuchi	2	4,329
Rural	4	134,526
Urban	66	423,879
National	14	562,734

Overall provincial access to public supply grid is highest in Kabul (47%), Balkh (41%) and Jawzjan (38%). Nuristan and Daykundi do not have access to public supply grid at all; and Bamyan, Badghis, Kunarha, Takhar and Laghman have access to less than 0.5%. Rural provincial findings of access to public supply grid is reported to be highest in Nimroz (33%) followed by Jawzjan (21%), Hilmand ((16%), Parwan (16%), Balkh and Kabul (14%) and Logar (10%). Nuristan and Daykundi did not report any use of public electrical power. In the remaining provinces, households reported limited usage of public supply grid. In the urban areas the percentage of households with access to public electrical power is highest in Jawzjan (99%), followed by Balkh (92%), Kandahar (85%), Nangarhar (81%), Hirat (70%), Baghlan (65%), Faryab (63%), Kunduz and Kabul (57%). Takhar is the urban reporting the most limited usage of public supply grid (2%).

Sources of lighting (%) during the summer and winter

	No lighting	Lamp oil	candles	Electricity	Generator	Battery	Gas	Firewood	Other	Number of households
Summer
Kuchi	4	92	2	1	1	0	0	0	0	187,035
Rural	1	86	1	7	5	0	1	0	0	3,016,183
Urban	0	24	1	61	6	2	5	0	1	627,844
National	1	76	1	15	5	1	2	0	0	3,831,062
Winter
Kuchi	3	92	1	1	1	0	0	1	0	185,814
Rural	1	84	1	6	4	0	3	0	1	3,004,954
Urban	0	26	0	37	7	2	22	2	4	626,266
National	1	75	1	11	5	1	6	0	1	3,817,034

Nationwide, during the summer, most of the households (76%) rely on oil lamps for lighting, followed by public supply grid 15%, generators 5%, gas 2% and the rest of the sources of lighting are used by less than 1% of households. One percent of households reported using no source of lighting. Kuchi households during the summer have the highest use of oil lamps (92%), as well as the highest percentage of households not using any source of lighting (4%), and low percentages of access to electricity and generators. The Kuchi are the highest users of candles (2%). The same pattern is present in the winter time. Urban households during the summer have the highest use of electricity (61%), oil lamps (23%), generators (6%), batteries (2%) and gas (5%). Less than 1% has no source of lighting. The same trends exist in the winter, except for the significant increase in the use of gas. Rural households during the summer present a pattern of use of lighting somewhere between urban and Kuchi households, except that none of the rural households reported firewood as a source of lighting. Rural households show similarity with Kuchi households in the use of oil lamps, electricity, battery, and gas; however their use of candles, gas and no lighting at all is similar to urban households. The use of different sources of lighting by rural households is not different in the winter.

Provincial findings for the Kuchi, rural, urban categories show that Nuristan and Kabul (46%), Balkh (44%) and Jawzjan (34%) have the highest use of electricity as source of lighting in the households in summer; in contrast Paktika and Zabul (0%), Badghis and Uruzgan (less than 1%) have the lowest use of electricity. Households in Nuristan, Balkh and Jawzjan have the highest use of electricity during the winter, but Kabul province shows a significant reduction during the winter; this could be because of shortages in supply and increases in the use of electricity for heating purposes. The provinces with the lowest use of electricity in the summer also have the same pattern in winter.

Use of oil lamps is high in all provinces. Zabul (99%), Badghis and Badakhshan (98%), Uruzgan (96%) and Paktika (95%) have the highest use of oil lamps in the summer; in contrast Kabul (29%), Nuristan (38%) and Balkh reported the lowest use of oil lamps. There is consistency in terms of use of electricity and oil lamps in the summer. Provinces with high use of electricity have least use of oil lamps and vice versa. A similar pattern of use is present in the winter.

Use of generators is reported to be highest in Ghazni (25%), Nuristan (15%), Paktya (12%) and Kabul (11%), while households reported their use in Laghman, Badghis and Zabul. Badakhshan, Ghor, Hirat, Hilmand, Jawzjan and Panjsher reported less than 1% use. Similar pattern of use prevail in the winter. No lighting at all is highest in Farah (5%), Uruzgan (2%) and Jawzjan (2%) and less than 1% across the country. A similar pattern of use prevails in the winter.

Gas usage is highest in Kabul (8%), Panjsher (6%) and Wardak (5%). None of the households in Paktika, Faryab, Takhar, Daykundi, Sar-I-Pul, Badghis, Badakhshan, Zabul, Jawzjan, and Uruzgan use gas as source of lighting in the summer. During the winter, Kabul (32%), Baghlan and Kapisa (11%) are the highest users of gas. Badakhshan, Nuristan, Bamyan, Ghor, Jawzjan, Uruzgan, Sar-I-Pul, Daykundi, Paktika and Badghis do not use gas for lighting in the winter. Candles have the highest use in Ghor (11%) and batteries in Kabul (3%); in the rest of the provinces their use is insignificant. The same situation is found in the winter.