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By Sarah Butler-Sloss, Ashden Founder Director
While the rising urban middle classes in India’s big cities increasingly take their mod cons for granted, some 400 million Indians have never used electric light bulbs in their homes – let alone had the power to charge their mobile phones, listen to the radio or watch TV.
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After winning an award in 2009 Svati Bogle has set up a social business, Sustaintech, that takes the robust model of delivering energy efficient cook stoves to the vast middle income businesses and street vendors across India.
Share this storyBy Julia Hawkins, Ashden PR and Digital Media Manager
The collapse of three main power grids in India earlier this week created traffic chaos, trapped miners underground, left bodies half-cremated, stymied commercial activity and forced those normally reliant on air-conditioning to swelter in 40°+ heat.
Share this storySarah Butler-Sloss, Ashden Founder Director
Yesterday's Guardian featured an interview with Ashden Award winners LH Manjunath of Indian microfinance provider SKDRDP (this year's international Gold Award winner) and Tri Mumpuni of IBEKA, a community-managed micro hydro scheme in Indonesia, about their hopes for Rio in June.
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(Ashden winner GERES has built greenhouses to improve farmers' yields with solar thermal energy in northern India)
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Abellon, who won an Ashden Award in 2011, has just commissioned a new solid biofuel manufacturing facility in Vithalapara, Gujarat. Covering 7.5 acres of land, the facility is the largest and first of its kind in Asia. It has the capacity to handle different kinds of biomass, and to process 75,000 tonnes of biomass pellets each year saving up to 100,000 tonnes of CO2. All agricultural residues will be sourced from farms within a 50km radius.
You can find out more about their work in their case study and film.
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The Ashden India Collective is already becoming a force for change in India. The Times of India recently reported that the Indian government has asked the group to contribute to the country’s policy for a rural electrification programme, particularly the scaling up of solar energy in off-grid rural areas.
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As part of our judging process earlier this year, David Fulford had the chance to catch up with BIOTECH Ltd, in Kerala, India. Their award-winning work is building domestic, commercial and municipal biogas plants. BIOTECH has grown a lot since winning in 2007 and as a result of their ongoing research and development, they’ve now developed two innovations which takes them closer to meeting the large demand for their biogas systems.
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Within Bihar, the so called 'darkest state' in India, a reliable supply of electricity to your home is not a reality for most people - just 10% of the state's demand is currently being met by grid electricity. Husk Power, one of our five 2011 international winners, has proved there is an answer. Their village-scale electricity grids are already bringing 32,500 households clean and reliable energy.
Share this story Share this pageThe views expressed on this blog are not necessarily those of Ashden.
