“Nepal is a poor nation and its rural inhabitants are unlikely
to have access to electricity—less than 1/3rd of them do,
according to the United Nations Develeopment Program. Expansion
of the conventional power grid is unlikely in the near future.
It’s already so strained that power outages are common in urban
centers, and major resources would be needed to connect remote
communities in mountainous terrain. Meanwhile Nepal’s electric
demand is growing at some 7 percent a year. Those without power
suffer health problems from cooking with dirty fuels and a lack
of medical facilities, limited educational opportunities, and
stagnant economic growth. Rural residents have long burned
biomass, dung that might have been used as crop-boosting
fertilizers or trees, the loss of which causes erosion and
produces carbon emissions. But the Government of Nepal’s
Alternative Energy Promotion Centre (AEPC) is administering a
micro-hydro program aimed at building community-operated plants
that can produce up to 100 kilowatts o