Rosa Power Supply Company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Power, which is a 1200 MW Coal fired Power Station (4 Units of 300 MW each). This Power Station is situated in Shahjahanpur District of Uttar Pradesh.

This interview was based on the “Go Green Initiatives” taken up by the Company with a view to install Solar Grids in the surrounding villages with a view to enhance the active time of the villagers.

1. What social issues did the project seek to address?

Education, Health, Livelihood & Environment issues were addressed through the Go Green Energy Initiative Project.

2. Elaborate the objectives of the project?

The main Objective of the project was to bridge the irregular electricity supply in the targeted rural households. This was also taken up to enhance the primary usage of electricity for 5-6 hours a day by students / Women / Rural Entrepreneurs like Weavers, Tailors etc.

3. Who were the stakeholders of the project?

Students, Women & Rural Entrepreneurs were the primary stakeholders and the secondary stakeholders were the “Public Distribution Shop” and Environment.

4. Who were the project beneficiaries and how were they selected?

Students, Women & Rural Entrepreneurs engage in various activities after sunset & early in the morning before sunrise. They were selected since they were the most affected due to the irregular supply of electricity.

5. What were the highlights of the project implementation? How did you ensure successful completion?

The nature of the implementation processes depend on the type and size of the project. Operational processes to ensure successful implementation of the project were:

• Need identification.
• Dialogue with the identified stakeholders.
• Acceptance of the project.
• Ownership of the project.
• Execution of the project.
• O&M of the project.
• Evaluation of the project.

6. What strategies were adopted to manage resources and optimize their value?

Group Formation & identification of volunteer from each village has been done to manage the resources and to optimize the values in respect to time.

7. How did the project plan to involve each stakeholder in the project? What were the institutional arrangements sought?

Sharing & transparency was an important component of the project execution plan. Engagement of every stakeholder and ownership was also ensured from the initial phase of the project.

8. Were there any significant roadblocks in the project?

Lack of awareness/knowledge about the utility of Solar Light in day to day activities was the major road block which was the cause for hesitation of everyone in the community to accept it in the beginning.

To overcome this hesitation, in each village we had discussed with likeminded groups and installed a One Solar Panel. When people saw illumination after the sunset, they started gradually accepting the utility of solar light and realized that this can play a major role to erase darkness in the period between sunset to sunrise.

9. What was innovative about this project?

Since the inception of the project, stakeholders were involved in each phase i. e information sharing / importance of the project / benefits of the project and the roles & responsibilities were also very clearly communicated to each stake holder of the project. Community Expectations were met through exploring renewable energy resources in form of Solar Mini Grid Plant.

       10. What were the impact indicator (short and long term) of the project?

Impact Indicators were specific measurable changes that could be seen in a short time where active life enhancement was up to 3-4 hours in the night wherein women had ample time for their cooking & other household work after sunset. Rural entrepreneurs i.e. weavers, Tailors etc had more working time which ultimately started providing them more income.

        11. What were the measures (internal and external) adopted for monitoring and evaluation of the project?

Each member of the groups were made responsible to assess the performance of their solar light in their houses. In a group, identified volunteers compiled the performance of each connection from their solar panel (Average 40 connections) and shared the same with the Operators. Periodic meeting was organized within groups (64 groups in total) to monitor the progress & sort out any technical / social issues.