| By Latoya BurnhamThere is a potential market for Barbados to export solar water heaters to the tune of about $1.4 billion.
Chief Executive Officer of Solar Dynamics Ltd, James Husbands said at the two-day conference on alternative energy being hosted by the Central Bank that there were countries like Trinidad that Barbados did not have a strong presence in that could be tapped.
Using statistics from a study done by USAID on the potential for solar water heaters based on replicating the Barbados model, Husbands said they had identified about 17.9 million people in about 4.5 million households who could use the technology.
“With an average penetration in some cases, like in the case of Trinidad, it has moved up to 25 per cent because there is a lot of interest now being shown in Trinidad, but in other countries a 50 per cent penetration rate would yield us the potential of market opportunity of US$1.4 billion. That is the potential that Barbados should go after in terms of replicating the industry across the Caribbean,” he said.
He added that discussions had also been held in Canada and there was “tremendous interest” in the expansion of Barbados’ model abroad.
The CEO of the company that has been noted as the local pioneer in solar heating, said Solar Dynamics had been able to replicate the model successfully in the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and it had showed the growth for a number of years.
“We have the experience of working in other markets and from that experience we actually export to Bahamas, we export to Belize and a number of the OECS countries. So the potential for harvesting some foreign exchange is there,” he said, adding that Barbados had established itself as a leader in the innovation and now had to capitalise on the ability to expand the industry.
Asked about such expansion, he told Barbados TODAY that it was not always as easy to get into the Caribbean markets as it might seem.
“One of the biggest challenges is financing for projects outside of Barbados. International financing would be an option; facilities either by Caribbean Development Bank or some of the other institutions like IADB making funds available against the reduction of energy in those countries is a possibility.
“Also there is the possibility of investment in the organisations which deal with renewable energy. There is a possibility that presently those who have private companies may wish to look at, whether those companies can raise capital either on the local market or otherwise to expand their operations overseas or to be in joint ventures with other people,” he said.
As to whether Solar Dynamics itself was exploring such options, Husbands would only say: “We don’t rule out any of the options, but sometimes there is need for a lot more than just what we come up with and sometimes as a smaller organisation, even though we’ve demonstrated that we can do things, there is an inherent reluctance in the Caribbean generally for us to be supportive even when there is evidence of success. We still have problems with that.” latoyaburnham@barbadostoday.bb |
