The IDES program is a one-of-a-kind women entrepreneur driven microgrid initiative combined with clean cooking. It utilizes renewable energy sources to provide reliable power to families for immediate needs and long-term environmental sustainability by combining clean cooking, LED lighting, and mobile charging into a single system, addressing complex energy needs.
India
Project Location: Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh & West Bengal, India
Standard: Gold Standard
Systems Deployed: 25,800
Women Self-Help Group Members: 3500
Future Project Expansion: 80,000
IDES is an energy innovation that presents a one-stop solution in rural parts of India grappling with the adverse effects of climate change. With solar PV modules, charge controllers, batteries, solar power-assisted cookstoves, and luminaires for lighting, IDES allows consistency in households’ energy use for cooking, lighting, and device charging. It addresses crucial issues of disaster resilience, women’s health, and energy access.
These forced-draft cookstoves have a fan integrated into the cookstove, which runs on the solar power produced by the IDES panel. It effectively minimizes the exposure to Household Air Pollution (HAP) for the women and girl children of the household. These households provide very tiny spaces for cooking, and reducing smoke is crucial for household health.
The program incorporates financial innovation within a demand-side market approach. Households must cover 65% of the IDES system’s cost, with 25% financed through community-led women’s self-help groups (SHGs) and the remaining 40% by the manufacturer via a mainstream debt line. This debt is repaid through carbon credit sales. Thousands of women in socially sensitive zones of northern India are essential to the program’s success, acting as sellers, financiers, and users of the system. Many also work as technicians, enhancing their roles as energy entrepreneurs and significantly contributing to gender inclusion and income generation in their communities.
The solar component of this system enables far-flung rural populations to access cutting-edge solar technology, including storage. This unique system is important for communities who live in these project areas as the people are subjected to the most severe floods at least once every year. A portable clean energy device is essential for the survival of such periodically displaced populations. Also, harnessing solar energy with storage capabilities helps households access lighting and mobile charging throughout the day.
The program areas get flooded every year, and the IDES is a great example of a clean energy device coming to the fore in disaster relief. These populations are displaced to flood relief camps that hardly provide access to any energy source. Now, with the IDES—a boxed energy system, these households can carry their solar-powered microgrid infrastructure with them, helping immensely in disaster relief logistics, as functional mobile phones can be highly useful for such relief coordination in camps.
This program is a multi-stakeholder approach to energy access, technology innovation, and knowledge management. It involves local government subsidies, philanthropy capital, microfinance, SHG microloans, and mainstream banking to achieve the results that it does—a true example of partnership for goals.
These forced-draft cookstoves have a fan integrated into the cookstove, which runs on the solar power produced by the IDES panel. It effectively minimizes the exposure to Household Air Pollution (HAP) for the women and girl children of the household. These households provide very tiny spaces for cooking, and reducing smoke is crucial for household health.
The program incorporates financial innovation within a demand-side market approach. Households must cover 65% of the IDES system’s cost, with 25% financed through community-led women’s self-help groups (SHGs) and the remaining 40% by the manufacturer via a mainstream debt line. This debt is repaid through carbon credit sales. Thousands of women in socially sensitive zones of northern India are essential to the program’s success, acting as sellers, financiers, and users of the system. Many also serve as technicians, enhancing their roles as energy entrepreneurs and significantly contributing to gender inclusion and income generation in their communities.
The solar component of this system enables far-flung rural populations to access cutting-edge solar technology, including storage. This unique system is important for communities who live in these project areas as the people are subjected to the most severe floods at least once every year. A portable clean energy device is essential for the survival of such periodically displaced populations. Also, harnessing solar energy with storage capabilities helps households access lighting and mobile charging throughout the day.
The program areas get flooded every year, and the IDES is a great example of a clean energy device coming to the fore in disaster relief. These populations are displaced to flood relief camps that hardly provide access to any energy source. Now, with the IDES—a boxed energy system, these households can carry their solar-powered microgrid infrastructure with them, helping immensely in disaster relief logistics, as functional mobile phones can be highly useful for such relief coordination in camps.
This program is a multi-stakeholder approach to energy access, technology innovation, and knowledge management. It involves local government subsidies, philanthropy capital, microfinance, SHG microloans, and mainstream banking to achieve the results that it does—a true example of partnership for goals.
Resident
Purnea, Bihar, India
