TARSHEED: Kuwait’s multi-million Power Consumption Awareness Campgain
For the foreign reader, Kuwait is a small country on the coast of the Persian (Arabian) gulf in the middle-east. Despite it’s small in size, Kuwait is estimated to be holding %10 of the world’s oil reserves. Being so rich in oil has made this small country one of the most consumption and least productive societies. It was two decades the elite among the gulf countries around it. Now and gradually, all countries around us have improved while we managed to go lower and lower. We simply had a lot of money to even care about the future. Some day we will wake up and see our oil wells are not pumping any oil and it will be too late.
Now, back to the subject. Following the power crisis we had last year, and very often a scheduled power and water cut on citizens was enforced, this year some people did not waste the opportunity and started a silly huge massive campaign called TARSHEED to increase awareness of lower power consumption with the slogan “The solution is with increasing awareness”!. This is a complete joke for me and a silly thing to say. Right now, you see those campaign ads in the street, on TV, newspaper, and the more silly thing is, on every Kuwait TV Channel you see this power-meter at the bottom-right:
So in case, for any reason that I can’t even find an example for, when you are watching Kuwait TV Channel, you will see a power meter indicating where are we on power consumption level. Yellow means beware, Red means turn everything you don’t need off! And they will start calling you to say your power consumption is high, lower it. Good God, what about your level of planning? Don’t you think it needs attention to? Now I won’t say the campaign did not make some people more alert, but the reasons I say it’s a joke is:
- Kuwait has %10 of world oil reserves and we have to worry about power!
- Kuwait is known of lending countries money and never taking it back. Most of these countries did not stood up to Kuwait during Iraqi invasion. Another thing to note. So we are not lacking cash money.
- Kuwait had built complete infrastructures and projects for neighbour Arab countries while they ignore their own.
- The Tarsheed campaign has a budget of 10m KD. Thats over $35.5 million dollars! Can you believe a country would spend so much to aware 2.5m people just to lower their consumption? Someone is making quite a lot of money from that campaign and the government mistakes.
- The increase in power and water consumption was known and ignored for decades. Few years back a group of consultants from outside were brought to study the power generation upgrade plans, and whether they were necessary or not. The report did not say they were necessary only, but they are not enough for the years to come. So what did the ministry of power do? NOTHING. Absolutely nothing.
- Now that it’s too late, power generations are air-shipped from all over the world, that the world’s largest cargo airplane landed in Kuwait Airport (somehow!).
- The companies who are coming for saving us are being penalized with thousands of KD for every day delay. Now that’s normal by it self, but if you are so much caring about deadlines, you got a hell lot to explain.
- Statistics say that most people in Kuwait don’t pay their power and water bill, and yet, no one gets cut from the services. Increased Awareness here for paying users is “Don’t pay for something you can get for FREE”.
- Result from not paying for years summed up into huge bills (even though prices are discounted for power and water) and people started making legal demands in the parliament to wave away the current bills! Why, and for what good reason? And about the people who were good paying customers?
- The calls were heard and a credit of 2000 KD was made for every citizen for power.
- Few years later after giving 2000 KD credit, we find out we lost power even though we are regular paying users! Why? Because the people who were not paying for years are overusing it! Now we should all behave and reduce our power consumption! We have a saying in Arabic “You cannot give what you don’t have”. So why did you give credit when you actually lack the power it self? Just cut it from non-paying users. You will increase awareness of power value then. Problem solved! No need to pay for campaigns, make money instead.
- Tarsheed campaigns have guide rules: Set your air conditioning to 25 degrees C. Kuwait easily reaches 50 degrees at midday so what the hell would 25 degrees do me? I can turn it off and it will be the same inside.
- Campaign also asks: Do not use heavy power consumption equipment during peak hours (midday hours). So no PS3 or XBox 360 at the time. No washing clothes as well. No, No, No.
- Huge government and corporate buildings have all their lights on when they actually leave work at 2:30 PM!
- Most power consumption comes from oil factories and wells. The percentage of human power consumption is so low relatively that makes the difference so negligible.
- Tarsheed Ads in the street are in six different languages. Now in Kuwait, the two known languages are English and Arabic. If you don’t speak any of the two, you are most likely a low-income person who is trying hard to make some money to raise his family. Most those people live in groups and they will be lucky if they have a TV. Let alone that they are outside the house most of the day. So what good does the campaign do?
- Summer games are made and you can watch them on Kuwait TV. They play water contest games and in the end they ask you to follow Tarsheed in lowering water and power consumption.
- New tall buildings and large shopping malls are opening and rising every day. Kuwait wants to open to the outside world when it’s not capable of handling people inside it.
- The Ministry of Power in Kuwait have asked the Ministry of Education to postpone school openings next year for 2 weeks for the temperature to go down a bit and avoid disastrous power failure. So now, the power needs controls education. And the power problem will not be solved until next year as well! Not even improved. Wonder if they will ask government to cut down working hours. That would be at least something useful :).
- When Kuwait is trying to install new power generators, people from inside tell, the problem is bigger. The infrastructure it self cannot handle that much capacity and needs to be changed!. This explains the request sent to postpone schools.
I could go on and on with the list, but I am afraid I would not stop. I did not only come with problems however. I have a solution.
Solution: OLPK (One Laptop Per Kuwaiti)
The $99 One Laptop Per Child would work best for us here I say. Laptops are lower power consumption than PCs, but this one is even better. It has no power consumption and uses manual crank to charge it. So let’s do a simple quick math to see how this would work:
- PC along with it’s monitor consumes up to 175w. Sleeping time its 35w. Let’s say it’s 90w on average.
- 10m KD Tarsheed campgain -> $35m
- OLPC Price: $99
- Number of Laptops with Tarsheed budget = Budget Campaign / OLPC Price = 353535 units
- Power Consumption Saving = Average PC Consumption * # Units = 35.5 Mw.
Not bad at all when the guys freak out for 100 Mw increase. And it’s a permanent solution without any campaign headaches.
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Comments
Blue Dress: let me share something with you. I heard from several sources that by law they are not allowed to cut power on anyone, for in case there is sick person or something. Result is, it was cut on everyone :)
LOL Bashar! Laptops aren’t going to help. We need to build homes underground so the AC doesn’t have to work as hard :P
3baid: LOL. Yeah yeah, everyone wants to sell his product now. Sorry I came first. 2008 its OLPK. 2009 you can build your basements :>
The XO computer is a real leap in power management for computers. Think a week’s usage from one battery charge! But it will not be from a hand crank – it will be from a yoyo: http://www.olpcnews.com/hardware/power_supply/
I can’t imagine how much money I would make in the real estate business if all homes were forced to be rebuilt underground!
Amazing how you are able to rattle all the impressive statistics, except you really forgot one important one, what are you doing about the Bidoon, or that’s not important statistic, perhaps you can educate your self on the plight of these deprived people. Are Kuwait’s that ignorant or caulis not bring this important humane suffering to the for front.
America helped your country to freedom, why not help the bidoon to their freedom, if you are unfamiliar with bidoon, visit Jileeb Al-Shyookh, or Al-Jahra, and see for yourself how they live, no jobs, no education, no birth certificates, no identity what so ever.
Wake up Kuwait the whole world is aware of the humanitarian problem and has been recognized by the UN. Please don’t wait until Kuwait is embarrassed on CNN, 60 Minutes, or even perhaps on Oprah’s Show.
Al
Al: Bidoon is a huge problem in Kuwait but I don’t see how their statistics could relate to my post in any way. You seem to be mixing unrelated issues together.
The Bidoon need a voice, Kuwaiti’s seem to ignoor this issue and pretend that it does not exist.
you can not have tesheed, if your poor brothers and sisters are suffering.
Al: I don’t over look the bidoon but Tarsheed is a silly campaign for water and power consumption reduction. Natural resources not in any way related to the nationality in Kuwait.
Al: Although I can understand your frustration with the fact that the Bidon problem is not dealt with I still can not understand this unrelated post on your behalf. Bashar is talking about a campaign launched to deal with power and water consumption and how is it that it is a wasted effort. Posting about another subject here is similar to someone criticizing the United States foreign policy in E3 Expo!
Again, We sympathize with your cause yet this is not the place to discuss it. (not on a technical blog)
Bashar: Well said about the Tarsheed drama (or Tahreej as I call it)
Gentlemen,
I would like to learn more about the Kuwaiti energy crisis as I may have a very viable solution to help alleviate the issue.
Thank you.
Ben
Sorry chaps,
Just to add some meat to the bone – It involves the use of microgeneration units that we are trialling herein the UK to great effect.
They produce electricity at source, cold air, and warm water – all of which could be a phenomenal opportunity in your climate and with the issues you are encountering.
Ben: Thanks for dropping by. Kuwait power crisis as I know has two parts:
1- Power Generators are insufficient to generate enough power.
2- The underlying infrastructure and cables cannot adapt to the increased usage we have.
As for the climate, our problem is mainly in summer when it’s extremely hot. We are talking about 50°C. The crisis is avoid thanks to the many people who are traveling abroad at such time of summer. So a solution based on cold air may not be sufficient.
If I am not mistaken you want to get in touch with the guys officially to propose a solution right? If not, just ignore the part below and sorry :)
The english site of the ministry is under construction unfortunately. But this is an english Google translation of their contact numbers in Arabic here.
our time is GMT+3, and working hours right now in Ramadan (fasten month) are approx 9 AM – 1:30 AM I think. After that (around 15th Oct) it’s 8 AM to 2:30 AM.
I am not an electric engineer, but feel free to fire any questions you have and I will try to help.
i think Kuwait should start using ulternative enery, i mean go outside and look above you, there is the world largist energy source, the SUN !! and you hav lots of thet in the middle east, i mean back in Scotland wher there isnt that much sun so many people use solar panels, so these big malls and government buildings have to start using solar pannels,that energy can also be stored and used in times when there is no sun,only then there will be a huge cut of energy cunsumption!! :->
Alexander: What you say is absolutely correct. The problem is with people caring to take action not the idea. Even now not a single suggestion was made to use solar power to generate energy, even though we only have crisis in summer when it’s extremely hot.
Guess the best solution is to have our own custom solar power in the house right :)
Hmmm…
Solar power maybe? I assume there is quite a excess of free solar radiation there.
Underground housing would be a good idea too, assuming that the water table (probably rather saline) is not a problem.
dharmadove: It is indeed as you said, solar power is a good choice. Regular power generators are also viable option. Problem is, no one has been doing any work on that until we run out short and now looking for ASAP solutions.
well im not a foreign but im a reader ;p
My god this oil thing seriously scares me , are we stupid jad jad….
Since half the country is aware of this fact why isn’t anyone doing anything?!
That’s such a Kuwaiti cliché, we care more about what people think of us and the image we preserve than what we really are!
Ahhh soo typical
Lol …… all this money wasted on the stupid campaign I mean they have been threatening our house for days now and still they didn’t cut anything…
And since our house is also rented to two other families they are neglecting the fact that
There are three families living in the house…
Bijjj yalla ma3aliH
Once stupid will always be