Shivraj Nishad spreads jasmine and rose flowers onto trays in his village in northern India to dry petals used for making tea, aided by a solar-powered dryer in what may be a nascent rural energy revolution.
Nishad, 29, returned home to cultivate flowers on a family plot in Sheikhpur by the Ganges river in Uttar Pradesh state three years ago, after becoming frustrated by long hours as a travelling representative for a pharmaceutical company.
His micro-business breakthrough came when he invested savings of 60,000 rupees (US$730) to buy a solar dryer, which includes two solar panels that power fans to waft warm air over thousands of flowers in batches of 60 kg.
The covered dryer halved the traditional open-air drying time, doubling production of petals sold to make blue tea and other floral teas. That enabled Nishad to buy from farmers far beyond his 0.6 acre (0.2 hectare) family plot.
“The dryer helped me establish trust in my business,” he said, spreading out lapis blue pea flowers and white Arabian jasmine, infusing the warm afternoon air with perfume.
India is seeking innovators like Nishad as tiny contributors towards a national goal of installing 500 GW of energy from non-fossil sources by 2030, part of wider UN targets to end poverty and to fight climate change.
The world’s most populous nation, India is achieving slow but steady growth in businesses that do not rely on an electricity grid, including solar dryers, biomass-powered cold storage, and solar silk-reeling machines.
But high costs, the difficulty of obtaining clean energy technology, farmers’ lack of access to markets and inadequate information for budding entrepreneurs remain big barriers.
Nishad now sells 500-1,000 kg of flowers per month, worth up to 400,000 rupees, with profits of about 100,000 rupees. The business also helps hundreds of farmers in the region and provides at least 10 year-round local jobs, half of them for women.
Monsoon boon
Nishad’s dryer, comprising trays placed on a metal stand under a roof of polycarbonate sheets with a total area of about 5 sq metres, is especially valuable during the monsoon when flowers usually get wasted.
“The solar dryer saved me from getting demoralised in rainy months,” he said. Nishad can dry two batches of flowers a day, against just one using open-air drying.
A May 2023 report launched by the Indian renewables minister R.K. Singh identified 12 promising off-grid technologies, including solar pumps and solar dryers. These technologies could help 37 million people in India, the report said.
Prepared by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water, an Indian think-tank, the report said that the 12 “decentralised renewable energy” (DRE) technologies can generate business of US$50 billion for manufacturing enterprises alone.
At the time, Singh said that India might soon come out with a specific policy to promote DRE technologies.
