Energy efficiency (EE) and energy access (EA) interventions in India have often had disjointed goals and taken separate paths towards achieving those goals. The Government and DISCOMs have focused mainly on expanding and strengthening the grid for meeting universal EA objectives. This approach has been faced with severe challenges for providing round the clock power to rural consumers because of the high cost of supply and revenue losses incurred by DISCOMs. Decentralized renewable energy (DRE) technologies and energy storage have for long proved as useful complementary solutions for enabling quality energy access among rural consumers. However, energy efficient (EE) operation of rural end-use loads and power supply systems is often overlooked in EA interventions involving grid extension.
DRE players operating micro / mini-grids have for long been adopting energy efficient end-use technologies in their efforts to minimize the overall cost of energy service. This essential feature of providing efficient energy access to rural consumers is missing in the Government’s efforts (e.g. Saubhagya scheme).
Efficient end-use consumption is at the heart of any DSM program, and Low Voltage DC (LVDC) appliances have flared quite well. There is high proliferation of LVDC appliances like LED bulbs and lights, BLDC fans, and BLDC motors in Air Conditioning, washing machine and other applications, with advantage of improved electronic controls and resulting EE, but most of them are powered by AC supply. This split of LVDC appliances market in India 1) running on AC supply only 2) running on DC supply only and 3) can run on AC or DC, has led to economies of scale not building up on supply side, keeping LVDC EE appliances price still premium and lower adoption.
This Webinar shall focus on one such appliance “BLDC Fan” that can give greater than 60% energy savings overall, but current volumes of National use has kept its pricing 65% higher than base models. Both urban and rural use and economics shall be looked into, together with new potential business models. Some top questions that shall be looked into are:
- How is demand for EE fans in India – rural and urban?
- How is its supply market evolving? What technology models and options?
- If and how, a new class of BLDC fan with an external AC-to-DC adaptor can be made to run on AC or DC supply, can disrupt the market and help pull EE premium down?
- What further innovations on product/ technology side and business models can lead to UJALA like programmatic replacement of existing fans with higher EE LVDC fans?
- If and how learning from BLDC fan case study can be extended to other motorised home appliances like Air condition, Washing machine and others?