From power to alternative

The new chairman at Enemalta would no doubt have followed very closely the economics of the last few days' blackouts in the US and Canada. And my feeling is that he shares the Tabarelli view that in Europe - Malta not excluded - we will, sooner or later, be in the same soup of generating capacity becoming increasingly short of demand growth.

Some would argue that our present generative capacity, Delimara and (shades of!) Marsa, should be enough (given correct subdistribution channelling) to keep us going at present demand growth rates. But of course the problem is how you calculate the latter, and what you input into your projections for future demand.

The powers that be thought we were getting it right in the years when the decision to build Delimara was taken, and when the decision to give the big equipment contract to a prominent Indian firm was given.

Along with other Commonwealth public enterprise chairmen then attending the first CFTC-IIM-NIPA top management forum in India and Malaysia I happened to be in the New Delhi head office of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited when its chairman proudly announced to our group that he had just received confirmation of their having won Malta's call for bids for Delimara.

This was August-September 1989. To questions from our group that gentleman was generous with data of the planned generation capacity of Delimara, but several of us sensed there and then that the wider economics of alternative energy generation had not been a feature that had been given much thought from both buyer and provider sides.

In later years other experiences with local authorities, some even in official capacity, confirmed my view that unless there is a thorough conviction shift at the power-to-decide levels in favour of suitable getting away from "power" and at least partial move towards "alternative", then Malta's constantly 'tense' situation in this vital economic area of energy provision will subsist.

The country has serious limitations to make possible economic production of wind energy, wave energy, nuclear energy, and so on. But solar? Who will convince me that mass scale use of domestic solar heaters (i.e. produced and supplied at highly subsidised prices plus tax incentives on top of the cake), of small domestic generator units, and, above all, of taking off the grid a lot of our street lighting, will not reduce pressure on the generative demands made on Delimara and Marsa?

Just think of it. Every single building (hotels, industrial, residential or whatever) in Malta using water heated with solar, not electric, energy. Or the whole of Bahar ic-Caghaq coast road, the Marsascala, Sliema-St Julian's, and Qawra promenades, and so many other lengthy public road energy guzzlers, all regularly providing lighting through solar energy which they would have stored from Mother Sun... which is out, visible, strong and productive in this beloved land of ours for close to 365 days per annum.

Is this fantasy? Not quote from what I've seen in other countries with far fewer annual sunlight hours than we have. And I also happen to know for a fact that at least a decade ago Enemalta had received investment approaches from would-be US and other operators of such facilities. But the then decision makers' obsession with "only power energy" ran such proposals into the ground.

After New York, Canada, some places in Europe, and yes even Malta during this year's heat wave, shouldn't there be a more visible change of tack? I suppose a whole host of much more knowledgeable technocrats will come out with answers to justify past failings.

But many of us are not really interested in that. What we really look forward to is that evening PBS news item which would go something like this: "In 200? x per cent of Malta's energy needs was supplied by... (source, alternative however to conventional power).... This was an x per cent increase on the previous year, and shows, even if small, an encouraging shift away from conventional sources. Enemalta's chairman expressed satisfaction at this progress, as well as conviction that such progress will be at an even faster rate in coming years...!"

Hope springs eternal in the human breast!