Rebirth of England.

Chapter 876 Solar Energy for Home Use

It is also because after the EU launches the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), Europe's economy will bottom out and begin to recover, so the capital and companies controlled by Barron will continue to expand their investment in Europe.

This includes Cavendish Asset Management, which entered the German property rental market by acquiring Euronext Bank's previous non-performing assets involving real estate mortgages after the subprime mortgage crisis.

In addition, Argos Retail Group will continue to improve its sales network in Western Europe and expand its services to cover the whole of Europe.

Especially in European countries where the economic situation is not very good, such as Greece, Ireland, Spain and other countries, Argos Retail Group has developed well.

After all, through Argos' increasingly complete supplier system in China and West Africa, many of their own-brand products have very high cost-effectiveness in Europe.

Especially the small household appliances on Argos.com, because the holding company of Argos Retail Group is the holding company of Supor, this Chinese company has received all-round support from them in terms of technology, capital and sales channels, and has developed extremely rapidly.

Initially, Supor's small household appliances were sold in the European market under the name of Argos' own brand. Now their SUPOR brand has become quite well-known in Europe, with sales increasing year by year.

Not only has Supor entered the European market through the Argos retail group, its small household appliances have also been popular in Africa, especially West Africa.

As we all know, the biggest obstacle to the popularization of electrical appliances in Africa is not their low income, but the deployment of power facilities in many areas there.

After all, if your income is low, you can still choose cheap electrical appliances, but if there is no electricity, then even if you buy electrical appliances, they can only be used as decorations.

China also achieved electricity access in every village in 1987, and only achieved electricity access in every household after successfully solving the problem of the last household without electricity in 2006.

Even in South Africa, the country with the highest electricity generation in Africa, 2011 million people still had no access to electricity in 300, and this is still the case for a country considered a "developed country."

In the original time and space, until 2020, only 10% of the population in Africa had access to electricity...

Even in Kolo, which is known as the "Kuwait of West Africa" ​​because it has the best port in West Africa and abundant offshore oil and gas resources, the government has relatively abundant funds and continues to invest in infrastructure. However, according to relevant statistics, more than 30% of households still have no electricity.

The areas where these families live are relatively remote, and the economic benefits of setting up power plants and distribution networks there are extremely low.

It is also for this reason that the West African Group has cooperated with the Kolo government to implement the "Solar Energy to Homes" program.

West Africa Electric Company was jointly established by West Africa Group and Kolo Industrial Investment Fund. West Africa Electric cooperates with relevant Chinese companies to install solar panels and power storage systems for Kolo families that do not yet have electricity at a relatively low price.

The reason why West Africa Electric can complete this work at a relatively low price is that the Kolo government will provide subsidies for the installation of solar power generation systems for each household...

In addition, most of the solar panels installed by these West African electrical companies come from China—they are “second-hand” panels that were disassembled and shipped from China.

From a very early stage, China has formulated policies to support the development of domestic photovoltaic power generation. In the beginning, due to backward technology, the photovoltaic solar panels produced by China were slightly behind those produced in the West.

However, with the development of Chinese enterprises in this field, the scale of its photovoltaic industry is also growing rapidly, and its technology is gradually catching up with and surpassing that of the West, with costs falling and product upgrades accelerating.

In his previous life, Barron had seen a piece of data. From 2007 to 2017, the cost of photovoltaic power generation in China dropped by more than 90%! Since 2012, China's newly installed photovoltaic capacity has ranked first in the world.

During this process, many of the photovoltaic solar panels that were initially used in China have begun to be replaced and upgraded. After all, there are products with lower costs and higher conversion rates.

What West African Electric does is to buy the obsolete solar panels from China at extremely low prices, transport them to Colo, and then install them in those households.

Although the conversion rate of these solar panels is much lower than that of current products, they can still generate solar power. The key is that as obsolete second-hand products, the price is extremely low - after all, the recycling technology of solar panels is not perfect now, so it is better to sell them at a low price.

During this process, West Africa Electric cooperated with some Chinese companies, who helped "recycle" solar panels in China, and then transported them to Colo, where West Africa Electric installed and deployed them.

Among them, Supor was the first company to cooperate with West African Electric - they valued the vast untapped market in Africa.

It’s not that Africans don’t have a need for electrical appliances, it’s just that most families didn’t have the pain points before…

Now that West Africa Electric has helped these families install photovoltaic power generation systems, we will be able to sell some "cost-effective" Chinese electrical appliances and small appliances here.

After proving that such an operation could be successful, not only Supor, but many other companies in China also got involved.

At the same time, West Africa Electric has become one of the largest sales channels for Huaxia home appliances in Colo.

And it is not limited to Colo. West African Electric, in cooperation with the Prosperous Earth Foundation, has begun to carry out projects to install household photovoltaic power generation systems at relatively low prices in the "West African Free Trade Area" countries around Colo, such as Ghana, Benin, Burkina Faso, etc.

It also made West Africa Electric the largest Chinese home appliance distributor in West Africa, bringing extremely price-competitive Chinese home appliances to these families - this is somewhat similar to the African version of the "home appliances going to the countryside" campaign.

In addition, the previous idea of ​​building a nuclear power plant in Kolo was temporarily shelved after evaluation.

Because although nuclear power plants can generate considerable electricity, they require huge investments, and maintenance after completion also carries certain risks - especially after the Fukushima nuclear power plant leak in Japan last year, the world has begun to re-examine the safety of nuclear power plants, and many countries including Nigeria and the United Kingdom have begun to re-evaluate their nuclear power projects.

More importantly, according to current technology, the cost of power generation from nuclear power plants is not low and is much higher than that from traditional power plants - of course, compared to photovoltaic power generation, the cost of power generation from nuclear power plants is still advantageous.

However, as the cost of photovoltaic power generation has decreased in recent years, it is predicted that it will not be long before the cost of photovoltaic power generation drops below that of nuclear power.

In this case, given Colo's latitude, its solar energy resources are also very rich. It would be better to turn to the construction of photovoltaic power stations in the future. The United Energy Group itself has photovoltaic power generation research centers in Britain and Saudi Arabia, and has already achieved some results that can be applied in this regard.

It is worth mentioning that the mainstream of global photovoltaic power generation is still silicon-based solar power generation technology, accounting for more than 80% of the world's total photovoltaic power generation.

The United Energy Group is currently focusing on concentrated photovoltaic power generation.

(End of this chapter)