National Programme for Energy Development of States and Municipalities - PRODEEM

The National Programme for Energy Development of States and Municipalities was set up to develop 20,000 MW of renewable energy capacity to power schools, health centres, community centres, and water pump systems. In 2000, PRODEEM served almost 104,000 people in 219 municipalities. The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) proposed to finance a project for providing electric power to rural residences. The PRODEEM Plan of Action was jointly prepared by the MME and the IDB implemented with a non-reimbursable fund of US$ 9 million. Between 1996 and 2000, PRODEEM provided 3 MW power to 3050 villages, benefiting 604 000 people. National Treasury Funds of 21 million reals funded the investment of solar PV panels for rural power generation. In 2000, another 1050 systems were installed to benefit an additional 104 000 people. The total budget was 60 million reals ($) for 2001, when 1086 systems were installed, and another 3000 community systems were tendered through international bidding, with a winning bid of 37 million reals for equipment and installation, along with operation and maintece for three years. PRODEEM was a centralised project, using a top-down approach to identify sites and install equipments. Rather than electrifying individual households, the programme focused on schools, health facilities, and other community installations. In 2003, the MME (Secretariat for Energy Development) undertook an exercise in analysing the programme and discussing the means to expand it, according to the recent law for Universal Access to Energy. More recently, PRODEEM and ANEEL sponsored mini-grid pilot projects (with hydro and biomass generation) to test different service provision models.