To ease the burden on the national electricity grid, The Bangladesh Rural Electrification Board (BREB) are going to install solar-powered charging stations for easy-bikes and battery-operated rickshaws in four different locations.
Within the next two months, four stations with 20-22 kilowatt capacity will be established in Mymensingh, Comilla, Gazipur and Narayanganj.
Easy-bikes have a set of five batteries with a capacity of 60V, which consume 1kW of electricity daily and take 4-5 hours to be fully charged.
More than 450,000 electricity-powered easy-bikes operate across the country, consuming more than 420MW of electricity per day.
The charging stations are going to be placed through the Palli Bidyut Samities and is funded in part by the Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority (SREDA).
A deal was signed between BREB and SREDA on Wednesday, whereby SREDA will be providing BREB with Tk25 lakh in financial aid.
SREDA Chairman Md Anwarul Islam said: “We are happy to stand beside the effort of promoting renewable energy.”
He added that easy-bikes were currently being charged from household connections, which placed additional strain on the national grid and made the solar-powered charging stations an ideal initiative for this sector.
He further stressed that the stations need to be placed in areas with unrestricted sunlight in order to be effective.
BREB Chairman Major General Moin Uddin said that lack of sunlight would not be an issue as a solar-powered charging station was already in operation in the Ruhitpur area of Keraniganj. The solar panels were installed on the rooftop of Sunny Filling Station.
“There was no need to acquire land for it. That station is serving 22 easy bikes on average per day” he said, before announcing that four more stations would be installed.
Thursday, April 25, 2024
