Fear of Darkness
Trip Start
Apr 26, 2005
1
23
42
Trip End
Nov 17, 2005
Lusaka,
Zambia
Friday, August 12, 2005
It's an early Friday night and I'm playing Age of Empires on my computer, procrastinating on writing the stories from my latest road trip through rural Zambia. That tour and the one previous took me through areas either unconnected to the electrical grid or populated with people too poor to pay their fees. Driving after dark we passed roadside settlements that looked desolate yet warm with
candle-lit stores, markets and bars. Back in the city the dark is decidedly less charming.
Midway through my game the power cuts, BBC World Service on the radio goes silent, my computer and the lights that keep me company go black. It's as if I've suddenly gone blind, but thankfully there's a flashlight on the table, left by my dad before he departed for his Mason's meeting. It's within arms reach and with it I find a candle and my way out of the darkness. But the candle's the only one in the house, a little nub that might last an hour and it's impossible to know how long the blackout will last.
It shouldn't be occurring at all. With many hydroelectric power sources, Zambia supplies electricity to Zimbabwe, Congo and East Africa. In places like the Kafue River and Lake Kariba, major power plants have been keeping the light on for decades, while more stations--like the one I saw in North-Western Province--are being built in even the most remote regions of the country.
With its strong-current rivers and history of peaceful civil society Zambia should be the powerhouse of southern Africa. So with the resources in place the onus is on the Zambia Electricity Supply Company (Zesco), a company my grandfather once worked for--staring out as a meter-reader and finally running the department.
Another relative, my late uncle, Gordon, used to work for the generating end of Zesco's operations. He fixed generators all over rural Zambia, and used to complain that the Russian and East German-built machines would break down again as he stepped through the door on his way out.
Those ancient generators have now mostly been replaced. It's Zesco's policies that are causing frustration now. Particularly disliked is load shedding, causing rolling blackouts as power is cut in one area and restored to another, sometimes just a few blocks away. The policy is so unpopular that riots occurred recently in Kaoma, in Western Province, where a mob destroyed equipment and several shops in the town. In an embarrassing twist, the deputy minister of energy is the area Member of Parliament.
When I visited Kaoma at the end of July the power problem was obvious, as sections of the town suffered from seemingly random blackouts. Sitting on the patio of a bar having an after-dinner drink, we were suddenly cast into darkness, and a collective groan filled the air. As the bar staff lit a few candles and turned on battery powered lights the power returned and things carried on.
Arm-chair energy experts attribute the shortages to either low water levels at the hydroelectric dams, caused by recent droughts, or that only one of the four generating turbines embedded in the Kafue Dam is working. The other three are apparently being serviced. (While both of these theories seem plausible I was unable to find any proof of either.)
And unfortunately for people in Kaoma and other areas, blackouts and load shedding are not equally distributed everywhere in the country. Even in the capital power supply can vary, sometimes within the same neighbourhood. Power is far more tenuous at my aunt's place, just across the highway and about a kilometre away from my dad's.
Naturally the situation is much worse in the rural areas, where vast swaths of the country still wait to be connected. But bringing those remote regions out of the dark is expensive. Part of the cost would obviously have to be paid by the consumers, and while some areas are wealthier than others on average many rural villagers would not be able to pay their bills.
There a more complications than just money. Aside from costly equipment like transformers, pylons and sub-stations, many of those rural houses aren't equipped or adequately built to join the grip. As far as rural development goes the priority seems to be on road construction, though even then, judging by the quality of country roads there's a long way to go. At an average cost of over $250,000 for just one kilometre of tarred road progress is slow. Expectant villagers without power will surely have to wait much longer to join the grid.
There are alternatives to that grid, though, like the solar-powered light seen glowing a pale and dreary blue-grey at night in remote guesthouses, bars and the odd school. But for reasons that seem known only to government the import and duty tax on solar equipment is prohibitively expensive for private use. With decent gusts across the country wind turbines could be a power source, but considering that even in the developed word wind power is still in infancy it's surely a long-shot alternative here.
For now, much of the rural areas settle into a semi-primordial night lit by cooking fires and candles. In the city I have little to complain about. In this section of suburban Lusaka power shortages are a rare occurrence, and the one that pitches me into darkness is the only I've experienced at home. So far.
The outage lasts just twenty minutes or so, and the radio and lights come on like a broken record that's found a way out of it's groove. I restart my computer and have a new story to work on, reminded of the necessity of modern comforts.
