Resource information
This guidance note talks about Rooftop
solar in Maldives. The Maldives Ministry of Environment and
Energy, with support from the World Bank and from the
Scaling Up Renewable Energy Program (SREP), a funding window
of the Climate Investment Fund,has designed a program
centered on solar photovoltaic (PV) rooftop installations to
take advantage of the Maldive's high insolation while
also coping with the scarcity of land. Expensive
diesel-fired generators operated by two state-owned
utilities keep the lights on in Maldives, an archipelago of
200 inhabited islands spread over 900 kilometers of the
Indian Ocean. But with the advent of affordable solar
technology, the islands’ abundant sunshine can be harnessed
for clean generation through private rooftop solar systems.
With World Bank support, an innovative guarantee structure
has been designed to attract private developers. The Asia
Sustainable and Alternative Energy Program at the World Bank
supported the development of the ASPIRE concept. ASPIRE’s
goal is to scale up solar PV generation from the present
level of 1.5 megawatts (MW) to between 20 and 40 MW over the
next five years by creating a bankable project structure
attractive to the private sector. To make the contracts
bankable, the government, its advisors, and the World Bank
worked to ensure a fair and attractive allocation of risk.
Finally, part of the SREP grant will be used to buy down the
tariff in remote islands, where more extensive PV
penetration will likely require additional storage capacity.
