"We can sell at such scale because the economics work," said d.light chief executive and co-founder Ned Tozun. Currently, d.light's lowest priced devices sell for $8 to $10. ![]() As the size of photovoltaic panels was reduced, so was the cost of integrated solar lighting and charging devices.Īs recently as 2008, products retailing at more than $50 dominated the off-grid lighting market in Africa, according to Lighting Africa, a project of the IFC and the World Bank. By 2010, many new products ranged from $25 to $50. Companies like d.light were able to downsize solar panels because of huge advances in the efficiency of both light-emitting diodes, or LEDs, and batteries. The key to tackling the big problem of bringing electricity to billions has been to think small. "What we're talking about is lowering the overall cost of an entire system needed to deliver a service. "It's not just plugging a light bulb in a socket," said Russell Sturm, global head of the energy access advisory at the International Finance Corporation (IFC), which works with d.light and other solar firms in the developing world. (It has sold more than 10 million units compare that with the largest utility in the United States, Exelon, which serves 10.3 million customers.) That's not an outlandish comparison, because many of d.light's devices truly are energy-delivery services, providing much-sought-after mobile device charging as well as light. In fact, if d.light were a traditional electric company, it would rank among the world's largest utilities in number of customers served. It's a little-noticed development with major implications for tackling climate change. More importantly, d.light and other entrepreneurial firms are showing how to bring power to many of the planet's 3 billion energy-poor citizens without costly construction of electric grids or the destructive growth of greenhouse gas emissions. That idea grew into Silicon Valley-based business, d.light, which will deliver affordable solar lighting to its 50 millionth customer this month. ![]() Goldman returned home with a conviction that there had to be a better way to meet widespread demand for household lighting among the world's poor. When Sam Goldman was a Peace Corps volunteer in Benin, Africa, 11 years ago, he saw his neighbor's son badly burned when the family's kerosene lamp overturned.
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