Myanmar micro Hydro Evolution: the Impact of ground-truthing and Multi-actor dialogue

Micro hydro in Myanmar has blown us away.  

Thanks to ground-truthing research done by the Renewable Energy Association of Myanmar (REAM), we came to know that Myanmar's micro hydro practitioners quietly, over the last few decades, have been designing, fabricating, installing, and sustaining several hundreds of community-owned micro hydro projects -- without external funding or technical support!  

This type of simple, steady, and scaled implementation of micro hydro is rare without external support.  HPNET member U Sai Htun Hla has commissioned 150 pico/micro hydro projects in the last 15 years.  His mentor, over 80 years old in age, U Khun Khaw, has commissioned over 100 projects and has stopped counting. :)  There are several others, including new practitioners from a younger generation, Ko Khun Aung Myo and Ko Zaw Min, who bring university training to micro hydro engineering and design processes, e.g. CAD tools for drawings and Google for self-training.

These practitioners have self-financed most of their projects, allowing the communities to repay the capital costs within 5+ years of commissioning.  Because the projects have been commissioned on very low budgets -- affordable by local communities -- they have been forced to use low quality hardware and no load controllers, leading to frequent technical issues.

But things are changing for the better:

• In Nov. 2014, HPNET member U Aung Myint, General Secretary of REAM, spearheaded a practice-to-policy exchange on micro hydro, with support from the WISIONS SEPS grant and many others.  The exchange brought proven experts from Indonesia, Nepal, and Sri Lanka to Myanmar to firsthand dialogue with policy-makers, civil society groups, international aid organizations, and practitioners.

• REAM's Nov. workshop encouraged the SE4ALL initiative -- led by the Myanmar government and the World Bank's off-grid energy program -- to invite the local practitioners to give their first-ever Power Point presentation and that too to an audience of high-level government, World Bank, and other national decision-makers!

• HPNET invited 2 Myanmar practitioners to its 2nd Annual Gathering of Practitioners, in Bandung, Indonesia, with WISIONS' support.  The practitioners were immensely inspired by the Indonesia's thriving private sector for micro hydro.  They saw the resulting transformation of turbine and load controller fabricators who had started with little experience but now offered standardized and fail-proof products.  With support from GIZ, the Indonesian fabricators had long formed an association of micro hydro developers, the Asosiasi Hidro Bandung, which has 100+ members committed to high quality micro hydro development and to lobbying for supportive policy.  The Indonesian progress relayed much-needed confidence to the Myanmar practitioners to build high quality hardware, be financially sustainable, and attract talented young engineers to their micro hydro work.

• The Myanmar practitioners were so inspired by the Indonesians, that within days of returning from the HPNET meeting, they kick-started their own association.  The Small Hydro Power Association of Myanmar (SHPAM) is now collectively voicing for targeted financing, technical knowledge, and institutional capacity building to upgrade their work. 

• We eagerly await to see whether SHPAM's requests are answered by the agencies involved -- particularly the World Bank, as it is assisting the Myanmar government to design its SE4ALL program this month!  We are hopeful that micro hydro and other renewable energy mini grids are equally prioritized with mainstream but disenfranchising electrification paths being considered by the government and international financiers (including the World Bank).

This evolution is an example of how ground-truthing and in-person exchange can rapidly lead to new developments.  Without REAM's study of the field situation and multi-actor dialogue, the local micro hydro practitioners in Myanmar would have remained invisible to the government and the World Bank, during a very critical phase in Myanmar's energy planning.  And without the Myanmar practitioners' visit to Indonesia, their confidence to form an association to lobby for solutions to improve their work would not have quickly transpired.

We will keep you posted on how the micro hydro (r)evolution in Myanmar continues. :)


By Dipti Vaghela, HPNET Coordinator