The International Forum
Oct 21 2005
Vol. 11, No. 38

By Hannah Kamenetsky

NRECA International has launched a rural electrification study in the Republic of Yemen , where most of the rural population is without power, after a 15-year absence from the Middle East .

The World Bank-funded study will develop a new framework for rural electrification in a country where almost three-fourths of the population is rural and less than one-fourth has access to electricity.

The project, in three phases, will review existing power infrastructure and present the findings in a report in November.

It also will map Yemen 's served and unserved population centers; examine the economic feasibility of renewable energy as a solution in isolated areas; and develop a framework for a rural electrification pilot project that will serve as a model for a World Bank project loan.

One of the reasons NRECA was selected by the Yemeni government to do the study is its interest in the electric cooperative model, said Paul Clark, NRECA International's vice president for business development and a member of the project team. “We're going to look at how cooperatives work in Yemen —not just in electricity, but possibly also in other services. We're going to see what works and try to build and improve on that.”

The NRECA team will be challenged to devise a workable model for delivering affordable energy to a rural population of 14 million spread over 310,000 square miles of mostly rugged mountainous terrain, according to Clark.

Most of the villages lack electricity. Some have power from the grid; others get power from isolated diesel systems placed by the Public Electricity Corporation, the national generation, transmission and distribution organization, Clark explained.

A team of four NRECA International staff members, including Director of Engineering Colin Jack, arrived in Yemen in September to launch the study, which will take about 10 months.

“I traveled around the country and visited the various electrical systems to see what kind of standards and materials and design criteria they're using and what kind of terrain challenges they'll be facing,” Jack said.

People in Yemen build villages on mountain peaks, he said. “You have to build up to the top of all these peaks, so you're talking about very long spans. That's something we've dealt with in Central America and South America , but it is a technical challenge.”

This is not the first time NRECA International has brought its expertise to this nation on the Arabian Sea .

In the 1980s, it provided engineering assistance for a rural electrification construction project in Yemen .

The Yemeni government also is familiar with NRECA International from a 2004 visit to Bangladesh by a group of power sector officials. The NRECA International project there helped create 67 electric co-ops that serve more than 5 million people.

Although Yemen has some petroleum reserves, it is a poor country, with per capita income of $570.

Power is generated by fuel oil, but plans call for shifting to natural gas and increasing installed capacity to meet demand, which is insufficient. Rolling blackouts are common.

While 72 percent of the population resides in rural areas, less than a quarter of the rural population has access to electricity.

Of those, only half are served by the electric grid; the rest are served by isolated power generating stations, which provide lower quality service for only a few hours each day, Clark said.