Can a power up in Africa make it a more powerful continent? Electricity is a gem in Africa! In some African nations, there are terms or phrases known by its every citizen, used to celebrate the moment when the electric bulbs and street lights (if available) lit up in the middle of stark darkness!
Yes, it is possible to spot an African nation, if you are up in an airplane; all you need to do is "look for the dark regions below".
There shortage of electric power supply in Africa may not have much to do with poverty though as there are many poor nations around the world, that don't have problems with electricity?
Just how bad is the electricity issue in Africa?
Well, it can be really bad! In some nations, the Math is simple; "You can expect only around 12 hours of power a day!" In some nations, they make it more blatant: "One day on, one day off!"
There are small electricity generators in most houses and electricity generators is huge business in Africa. Worst thing is many of these generators have to be imported and are expensive. Too, you will have to fuel these electricity generators and ofcourse in several African nations petrol is expensive. Yes, even petrol is scare and an expensive commodity!
You will say but Africa has crude oil; but hahaha, it is way more complicated than that as some of these African nations don't have working refineries, thus, they'll have to export the crude oil for refinement and import petrol back in. Isn't this huge business for some companies and loss for the poor masses? Sometimes, you are tempted to think, perhaps, government make much more money from taxes and these businesses, through bribery and corruption; that they never really want the nation to have electricity.
Whatever the case, one thing is obvious: "The presence of constant electricity in Africa will lead to massive development in Africa!" Many foreign businesses, simply don't consider the African regions as arable land for investments, sometime solely because of how much it will cost, to power up their industry with electricity.
Many simple crimes in Africa would reduce drastically, if there was light in Africa. "Many crimes in Africa, take place in the dark!"
In general, powering up Africa, in terms of electricity or even steem power, will remarkably fix Africa and enhance living conditions to a massive extent.
How can the steem blockchain be used to power up Africa? Blockchain is become ever more applicable in real life; so can we expect electricity in Africa soon?
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Very sensitive topic i must say, it's like a cancer that got cure and the cure is been shielded in some vault!
Indeed it is. Who knows what is really going on! No real way to understand why Africa has many natural resources but no power!
Beats all our imaginations.....
We also experience the same problem in Botswana
Woah, thinking you are the first person from Botswana on steemit! Followed you! Nice to meet you. How did you find steemit? Can you give a small breakdown here? Would be interesting!
Thank you, i think im the first person from Botswana, i have been following crypto currencies and saw 1 video about steemit on youtube, then i tried it
Botswana is Africa, Southern Africa....welcome brother!
Yes Southern Africa country
Like steem itself , a distributed solution is probably the way to go.
The price of solar installations keeps falling, but I guess for many the capital needed would be still too much.
For me the story of William Kamkwamba was very interesting to read: the economic impact of even the small windmill he made was very big on his family:
So economically it is a question of an investment with a pretty big ROI. Could a Steem powered version be a loan backed by Steemit.com reputation?
That only works if people are willing to participate and value their Steemit.com reputation obviously.
But if they could invest upfront and realise cost savings the loan could pay itself back rather fast.
Also, definitely encourage inventors like William just imagine steemit existed and we could follow his progress day by day ? Just imagine how much faster he could have progressed comparing his ideas with other inventors like him?
You might also enjoy the open source ecology project, I wrote a post about them. They create open source plans free for everyone how to build production tools and machines specifically designed to be built and repairable by the users without heavy investments. I wish these guys were on steemit so I could support them:
https://steemit.com/technology/@the-traveller/world-changing-ideas-open-source-ecology-and-the-global-village-construction-set
Here is an interesing article about solar: I know in India at least it is getting pretty common in rural villages to put up their own installations. They can´t wait for the government to figure it out.
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2016/aug/24/renewables-developing-countries-clean-energy-off-grid-investment-climate-change-mobile-money
Ethiopia has some big plans to bring electricity to the North East region of the continent. They've been building generators for the past few years.
I hope all of us on Steemit can help to make your community a safer place with the lights on! Thanks for sharing your story.