We use water every single day. When you take a shower in the morning, when you boil potatoes, make coffee or wash your hands. Water is a fundamental part of our everyday lives, but many millions of people in developing countries have limited access to water. Because if you are going to have water, you must either be connected to a water network or have electricity to pump water up from wells, rivers or lakes. Small agricultural communities in desolate fringes only have electricity if they produce it themselves, and so millions of small farmers around the world use small diesel generators to power water pumps. Then the farmers are not dependent on rain to cultivate their fields. But according to a new report from IRENA, the International Renewable Energy Agency, there is a huge rise in so-called off-grid solar energy for water pumps. These are used to irrigate fields in agricultural districts where the national power grid does not reach. In fact, the capacity of “solar pumps” has increased 40-fold in just ten years. If farmers can irrigate the fields regularly and are not dependent on rain, they can have a more stable harvest, which increases both food security and income. At the same time, farmers are becoming more resistant to climate change, which leads to higher temperatures and can delay the rainy season. The solar cells do not require as much maintenance as a diesel generator, and once they have been set up, farmers are no longer dependent on expensive and polluting diesel. The countries that make the most use of water pumps that run on solar cells are in Asia, where India and Bangladesh are far ahead of other countries. But there is an increase worldwide from Africa to South America. Solar is the cheapest In India there were 2.7 million solar-powered water pumps in 2022, both connected to the electricity grid and off-grid. Because the price of solar cells has fallen by 80 percent in the last ten years, they can compete with diesel generators, which are expensive to operate. The mechanical parts often break, they run on expensive diesel which is also subject to price increases, emit polluting particles and damage the climate. But for years, diesel-powered water pumps have been the best option for farmers in the developing world to get a reasonably secure water supply. In India, 8.8 million water pumps still run on diesel, even though the price of solar cells has fallen. It requires a larger upfront investment than a diesel generator, but over time solar cells are cheaper as they can produce electricity for 25 years. In other parts of the world Water pumps powered by solar energy are a solution that offers great prospects. In Africa alone, there are 600 million people who make a living from small-scale agriculture. Productivity is up to 50 per cent lower than the global average, because they are precisely dependent on rainwater. Farmers can increase their harvest by 2-5 times if the agricultural land is irrigated, according to SunCulture, which is the largest sub-Saharan African company that sells solar pumps. Therefore, the potential for solar pumps is enormous – although capacity has increased fivefold in Africa since 2012, the continent lags far behind in development compared to, for example, India.
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The sun pumps water over lands around the world
