Our First Year - Thank You!
In April 2012 energypedia moved into its first office in Eschborn, Germany. Since then a team of young, enthusiastic people have been engaged in taking care of the wiki, constantly supporting its users and promoting knowledge exchange for renewable energies and energy efficiency in developing countries. Within one year our registered user's figures rose from 1800 to almost 2500 while the number of articles also increased significantly from 720 to 820, excluding pages that were deleted. These figures demonstrate that our efforts are appreciated by you, our users, and that the topic of renewable energy and energy efficiency in developing countries generates a lot of interest.
So what can you expect from us this year? Two more portals on Eco-Mobility and on Financing and Funding of renewable energies are currently being developed. Furthermore, we will continue supporting our users in creating new content, wiki gardening and, last but not least, we will continue to look for new cooperation's. Furthermore, we will intensify our fundraising efforts this year. Please support us to keep energypedia free and independent!
Energypedia could not work without you - our valuable community of practitioners, experts and other interested stakeholders who are willing to share their experience and to write and update articles. THANK YOU to each and every one of you for your valuable contributions!
Tell Us Your Energypedia Story
Do you have an inspiring story to share with us--a story about how energypedia has helped you to make a change and promote the use of renewable energies? If so, we'd love to read it.
Tell us:
- How energypedia has helped you to make a change whether it's in assisting your work, writing a research paper or in providing energy access to poor people!
- Whether you have already used information gathered on energypedia for your work? Which kind of information did you use, how and where? What was the result?
- If you have made contact with interesting people via energypedia?
We are happy to receive your contributions in the form of emails, short texts, pictures or facts and figures. Elaborated stories will be promoted on energypedia.
Please write to info@energypedia.info and tell us your story!
Join Energypedia on Facebook!
We are pleased to announce our presence on Facebook. Please visit the new energypedia Facebook page soon and please be sure to LIKE us!
Energypedia.info remains the primary source for news and information about energypedia, but the new Facebook page, which will be updated with content from energypedia.info, will provide yet another avenue for those who wish to share experiences and ideas with others and stay connected to our events and initiatives.
Spreading the Spark of Wood Energy
Wood is the most important renewable energy resource and, at the same time, the oldest energy carrier used by mankind. In most of Sub-Saharan Africa and many other developing countries mostly wood energy is utilized to cover primary household energy needs for cooking and heating. Despite the tremendous efforts to enable electricity access, the dependency on wood energy will remain high due to population growth and economic development.
In recent years wood energy is regaining attention in the industrialized world as a renewable substitute for fossil fuels. In Yaounde, Cameroon, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) discussed recently the relevance of changing wood energy markets and how the wood energy’s potential for innovation and efficiency improvement can be realized within the work of GIZ. The participants discussed appropriate approaches to enable sustainable production, processing and usage of wood energy including holistic wood energy value chains, and required conditions on political, institutional and programme level.
The GIZ programme “Poverty-oriented Basic Energy Services (HERA)” provides a collection of talking points for lobbyists to illustrate that wood is a renewable, profitable and modern energy source, but also to point out principal challenges. The cooking energy compendium for practitioners and project planners also compiles relevant information about designing and implementing wood fuel supply interventions beside comprehensive information about cooking energy.
--> Read the Wood Energy Talking Points Here
--> Access the Cooking Compendium Here
Germany Quadruples Energy Surplus Over the Last Two Years
According to Reuters, while Germany has been phasing out its nuclear power plants, its power output has actually quadrupled between 2011 and 2012. The country’s Federal Statistics Office reported a surplus of 22.8 billion kilowatt hours over the last two years. The government has set a goal to source 80 percent of its electricity from green technology by 2050, leaving the old fossil fuel-based utilities behind. These figures appear to vindicate Germany's clean energy revolution, where support for renewables is subsidized by taxpayers and renewables are steadily chipping away at the dominance of fossil fuels.
--> Read more: Analysis: Renewables turn utilities into dinosaurs of the energy world
--> Read more: German energy surplus quadruples despite renewable push
Upcoming Events
Third Symposium Small PV Applications - Program Now Available
The symposium focuses on:
- Description of existing markets and state of art technology
- Open discussion of good and of bad examples of systems and distribution strategies
- Development of a vision for small PV-applications, their technologies and markets
The event will take place from June 17th – 18th, 2013 at the University of Applied Science, Ulm, Germany
--> Program Leaflet
--> Please find more events or add your own event on energypedias main page.
Template:Wl-publish: 2013-04-26 12:59:07 +0200
