-The Economic Times The April 28, 2012, issue of The Economist has a story on India's solar power and mentions Charanka village in Patan district, Gujarat. Solar energy can be converted into electricity, using photovoltaics, or can be converted into heat. (There are other technologies too, but those aren't important yet.) So far, solar thermal, or heating, in India has essentially meant solar cookers and water heaters, though it needn't stay that...

Boommi Gowda used to fear the night. Her vision fogged by glaucoma, she could not see by just the dim glow of a kerosene lamp, so she avoided going outside where king cobras slithered freely and tigers carried off neighborhood dogs. But things have changed at Gowda's home in the remote southern village of Nada. A solar-powered lamp pours white light across the front of the mud-walled hut she shares with...

A LEAFY VILLAGE in Kerala, Pathanpara, never found access to India’s electricity grid. That is why for the last several years, this village has been generating its own electricity. Raju, a dhoti-clad cashew nut farmer, operates Pathanpara’s five kilowatt (KW) micro hydropower plant. He lives in the village and earns a salary of Rs 2,250, paid by the People’s Electricity Committee (PEC). The power generated is shared equally by the village,...

A three-day Tarapur-Jaitapur anti-nuclear plant yatra was stopped the moment it began and hundreds of activists were detained at Boisar in this district on Saturday. Activists and supporters, including Justices (retired) B G Kolse-Patil and P.B. Sawant, social activist Vaishali Patil, and Admiral (retd) L Ramdas, were whisked away in police vans from Panchmarg Tarapur, where they had addressed a public meeting in the morning. They were brought to the Boisar...

Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) - Tamil Nadu plans to prepare a roadmap to enhance the competitiveness of healthcare sector in the state, and one of the main focus areas will be upgrading the primary health centres (PHCs) through public-private partnership (PPP). The industry chamber is also planning to promote solar energy, through pilot demonstration projects, with funding support from Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE). R Nandini, chairperson, Tamil Nadu...