Wednesday, 17 September 2008

SELCO features on Voice of America

SELCO, who won Ashden Awards in 2005 and 2007, have featured in a Voice of America article:

Group Brings Solar Power to Rural India
SELCO is a private company in Bangalore, India, that brings solar power to low income families and small businesses in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. It has twice won Ashden awards for Sustainable Energy.

Chairman of the Ashden Trust, Sarah Butler-Sloss explains, "By bringing together a package of micro-finance, of income generating training and encouragement as well as photovoltaic technology, they have found a way of showing how sustainable energy can improve the quality of life (of poor people) and they have done it in a commercial way," Butler-Sloss said.

The company's low cost solar home systems are sold to families and cooperatives that are not on the nation's power grid, bringing light and power to remote areas.

H. Harish Hande is the managing director of SELCO-INDIA says, "People come up and say 'my daughter has been able to complete her studies just because we have installed a solar light," Hande said. "We have increased our income. People even say 'my daughter was born under solar light rather than candles and kerosene."
Read the full article on Voice of America, including a video clip

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