Philips and Shell provide solar lighting to a Marsa Matruh

[DJKeefy]

Philips and Shell provide solar lighting to a Marsa Matruh village.

In partnership with Shell Egypt, Philips Egypt equipped Haqfet Elgallas village, in the western desert of Marsa Matruh, with solar lighting systems in houses, on streets and at other service establishments, Philips said in a statement on Monday.

Haqfet Elgallas, which was previously depending on gas-lit light bulbs, has become the first village to operate with solar lighting in Marsa Matruh governorate.

Under the auspices of Governor of Marsa Matruh, Badr Tantawy Al-Ghandour, Shell and Philips provided up to 15 houses, accommodating over 30 families, and one school with solar home-lighting systems.

Meanwhile, the partners also installed two solar light centres; one for a football field and the other will be used for street lighting.

“Both projects included the installation of eight-metre poles fixed in the ground to hoist four LED lights, which together consume less power than a single 60W light bulb,” the statement read.

Al-Ghandour said, that the initiative supports governorates and offers solutions to urban migration issue in Egypt.

“The governorate dedicates all its resources to assist such initiatives as they provide basic life needs for Matruh citizens, all while protecting the environment,” he added.

The solar lighting system initiative, which uses a new generation of solar powered LED lighting by Philips, aims at creating opportunities for social and economic activities in the village at night, Vice President and Country Chairman of Shell Egypt Jeroen Regtien said.

General Manager of Philips Tamer Abu El-Ghar said that such project will pave the way for future residential developments in Egypt.

The project is a part of the Light Center project adopted by Philips that “involves the installation of 100 light centres across rural Africa by 2015, with projects already inaugurated in Egypt, Morocco, Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa”.

Egypt’s ministries will depend on solar energy by establishing 25 solar energy stations on top of each ministerial building to “help convert thermal energy attained from the sun to electric energy,” former Minister of Electricity Ahmed Imam said in February.

The government also plans to produce 20% of the country’s energy through new and renewable energy by 2020, 12% of them will be generated using wind energy, according to Imam.

Source: http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2014/03/1 ... h-village/

[HEPZIBAH]

Let's hope this is the first of many.
I've read so many times that solar power isn't viable in Egypt. I'm no scientist but I fail to see why it wouldn't be a tremendous boost to life there.

[Dusak]

I watched an interesting documentary a couple of months ago concerning a very poor area of Venezuela. The houses had no electricity and unemployment was sky high., [bit like us here] So a light bulb supplier decided to kill two birds with one stone. For a cost of a one off payment of $5 he supplied homes with a small solar lighting unit which was connected to a long life bulb which gave the home owners clean light for the first time at night instead of the used oil they were using that was detrimental to the families health. Also he was able to reduce the cost to $4 enabling many folk to go self employed selling and installing the units at $1 profit. This is now big business in the country helping many unemployed people.

[Hafiz]

LED lights in homes could be a real winner for Egypt. The globes drastically reduce the demand for electricity and therefore save money for the consumer. Seems a no-brainer except they are expensive but what the hell they can find money to pay public servants 10% using one-off Saudi money and build 1,000,000 new houses. LED and other energy saving technologies would both save money and reduce the pressure on the outage-electricity system. In addition, and because a huge percentage is (unbelievably) by diesal powered power stations scarce currency is used to import oil.

Diesel generated power must be close to 80% of total power generation because hydro is only 20%.

[Glyphdoctor]

May LED lights never take off in Egypt. I can't stand looking at them. I don't think I could drive a car at night if there ever got to be a lot of cars with LED lights on the road. They are unbearable to me.

[DJKeefy]

May LED lights never take off in Egypt. I can't stand looking at them. I don't think I could drive a car at night if there ever got to be a lot of cars with LED lights on the road. They are unbearable to me.

I agree I am the same with WHITE lights, yet the led tail lights in RED don't bother me at all

[Dusak]

May LED lights never take off in Egypt. I can't stand looking at them. I don't think I could drive a car at night if there ever got to be a lot of cars with LED lights on the road. They are unbearable to me.

I agree I am the same with WHITE lights, yet the led tail lights in RED don't bother me at all

That is probably down to the fact that 99.9% don't work or have bulbs in to begin with.

[Hafiz]

The only LED globes available on imported European cars in this country are in parking lights. Maybe its different elsewhere.

LED house globes are available in a number of 'tints'. For example whiter tints for kitchens and warmer tints for living areas. Combined with wattage choices there should be no difference between these and incandescent or CFL globes. In the case of cars maybe similar options are available.

The savings to consumers in Australia of energy saving globes has been significant.

As far is Egypt is concerned, my garbled last point is that reducing home, shop, factory, street lighting not only reduces costs and greenhouse gases but reduces oil imports that it can barely pay for. You would think that the Egyptian electricity company would be subsidizing these to reduce outages and oil costs.