Transcript
ROBIN PENE: It sort of complements all of the development that's going on in the area, such as ah… just completed a bulk store and in the process of completing an eight apartment accommodation building - that all ties in. We have a freezing unit down that end and also a fish processing plant. That sort of ceased to operate at the moment due to the lack of power down there so now they can start looking at re-establishing it.
Presently I'm running an upgrade project over a period of three years. We're now moving towards stage three of that project, the third year like. To date, we've completed Matagi. There's still more work to do there, we're still in the process of upgrading the main part of the village.
In Fakaofo there, we're upgrading the supply in the main village by implementing an extra transformer and more cabling, upgrading the low voltage system and we're also going to trial a ten kilowatt wind turbine so once we've completed that then I'll move on up to Nukunonu and we'll upgrade the system there in the same manner, yeah.
DOMINIC GODFREY: So currently, how much of the nation's power is being generated sustainably?
RP: Well at the moment, if we get six to seven hours of bright sunlight a day, we don't need anything else. It's all produced by solar PV which supplies the village during the day and the extra power we use to charge a number of battery banks we have on island. And as the sun goes down and the radiation reduces, the batteries slowly take over so that the village runs entirely on battery power during the night, until the morning when it repeats itself yeah.
DG: So what happens when there isn't the six to seven hours of sunshine?
RP: Yes unfortunately we do get cloud cover, and of course the radiation factor reduces quite a bit, and in that case at the moment we have to start up the diesel and burn more diesel. On our annual basis there, at present we're about 80 percent renewable energy efficient. In 2013 after solar was established we had our best record and that was 92 percent renewable energy. When you consider that the system was only designed for 80 percent, so we did quite well that year. We seem to be getting more and more wet weather, probably due to the changing weather patterns, so we find ourselves having to use the generators considerably more than what we previously had.
DG: So hence the introduction of wind turbines?
RP: Yes so we're looking at alternatives. The Tokelau energy policy is that we're trying to become 100 percent so we're looking at ways how to manage that and the first one is the obvious wind turbine. The wind turbine technology these days has improved considerably in the last ten years. We have a low wind factor overall in Tokelau because of our situation in the world but it's sufficient for this particular type of wind turbine. I've gathered quite a bit of information from the weather stations we have on Atafu and Fakaofo and the results indicate that it is a possibility - well I've been told that it will work - so what I'm doing now is trialling a ten kilowatt wind turbine which will be the generation we'll use. We'll trial that for four to six months and if it proves effective, proves the data correct, then we'll implement probably three to four on each atoll. And that I see as bringing us up to 98 percent, to be conservative, renewable energy efficient.
