Sci-Tech & Solution

How much does a Solar panel cost in Nigeria?

by Felix Okoli  

Solar panels

It's no longer news that electricity supply in Nigeria is still inefficient. A report from Nigeria's power minister indicates that it's going to take a long time for the nation's power sector to be able to provide sufficient electricity for the over 100 million people living in West Africa.

As at now, public electricity supply in Nigeria only covers less than 30% of Nigerian homes and it's still not on a full time basis. It may very well take another 50 years to achieve this and many in this generation might not live to see it. Nigeria doesn't have nuclear plants yet and there don't seem to be any plans to invest in that any time soon but Nigeria's power sector is mostly powered by Water Dams around the country which generate what we call Hydro-electricity. Nigeria is looking to totally privatize the power sector which has been working effectively despite the billions of dollars already invested in it.

Nigeria is looking for alternative sources of generating electricity that can easily be managed and is considered green enough given that it's the common trend now in the modern world.

One of the ways through which Nigeria hopes to generate power is through Solar energy. However, there is no major solar plant yet in Nigeria that supplies electricity to homes like is obtainable in countries like the USA or Japan but the government is hoping that investors from China and USA will be able to include this when they setup their own power industries.

Given the situation in the country, it is mostly common for people now to generate their own electricity. May Nigerians living in cities are forced to generate their own electricity since they are even lucky to have power for at least 4 hrs in a day.

When it comes to using Solar systems to generate electricity, most Nigerians who are a bit tech savvy would know that one of the main things they'll need is a solar panel. However, the truth is that most Nigerians don't know the price of Solar panels being sold locally or where they can get a really good one. Some also don't know that some solar panels are of higher quality than others.

What is the price of Solar panels in Nigeria?
Well, based on what I've seen, Solar panels tend to vary in price as it depends on a lot of things such as the manufacturer's production cost, the shipping cost, exchange rate, custom duty fees, the quality, the size and so on.

A smaller solar panel would be much cheaper than a large one. A locally manufacture one would be much cheaper than an imported one. However, since Nigeria for now doesn't manufacture Solar panels, you'd find that most Solar panels in the market are normally imported and these come from countries like the USA and China. It's actually cheaper for Nigerians to buy Solar panels from China than from the USA however it seems most USA made Solar panels are mostly of higher quality than the ones you can get from China.

There are many companies in Nigeria that sell Solar panels and they source for such products from different markets and so when they add up their costs of getting it to Nigeria, they could arrive at varying prices.

Since the price of Solar panels tend to vary in Nigeria, I think the main question should be - "How cheap could solar panel sell for in Nigeria"?

Based on what I know, Solar panels used for charging mobile phones batteries are much cheaper than the ones used for charging laptop batteries. Hence, the ones used to power 12v deep cycle batteries at home to power things like your TV seem to cost the most.

Personally, I use a Foldable Solar panel which I hang on my window facing the Sun and this cost me $60(about N10200). I've also seen Solar mobile chargers which are meant for just charging mobile phone batteries and those ones cost about $30(N5100). In order to power my TV with a Solar panel, I would probably need a 100 Watt Solar energy and that costs about in the Nigerian market.

The bottom-line is that the Solar panel you'll need would depend on how much power you need. Solar panels are categorized based on their power output. A 100 Watt Solar panel will cost more than a 10 Watt Solar panel and it continues like that.

One of the first things to calculate before deciding on the type of Solar panels you want to buy is the Watt-Hours. This is basically a calculation you get by multiplying your Watt(Power) requirement by the number of hours you want those Watts.

Let's assume you want to power your TV with a Solar panel, one of the first things you'd need to find out is the power requirement for your TV. You can look at the back of your tv to confirm it. Let's assume it is 300 watts and you need to power it for at least 4 hrs. It then means that the Watt-Hours is 1200WH.

The next steps is to finding a Solar panel that can supply at least 1200 Watt-hrs and this power is normally going to be stored in a deep cycle batery.

Solar Panel Power = 1200WH/(4hrs*0.85) (where 0.85 is a common factor that allows for natural heat loss)

Solar Panel Power = 353 Watts or just 400 watts

You can simply get a single 400 Watt Solar panel unit, 4 units of 100 Watts Solar panels or 2 units of 200 watt Solar panels.

You are also going to need a battery to Store the power which the Solar energy has generated and a 12V Deep cycle battery would do. Based on our power requirements of 1200WH, a 100AH 12V battery will be able to supply a total of 1200AH for the 4 hrs.

So, to power a TV that has a 300w requirement every hour for 4 hrs, a 400 watt solar panel and 100AH 12V battery could do the trick. If the TV needs only 200 watt and you've got a Pay TV decoder that needs only 100 Watts, the power supply system used can still be ok.

So, what's the price of Solar panels in Nigeria? Well it is really hard to say since there are few online sellers in the market. It shows that Solar panels are really scarce in the market as one is more likely to only find smaller solar panels than larger ones. Small solar panels are more common in Nigeria and normally used for charging smaller solar devices like mobile phones and tablets.

I've checked at several online shopping sites in Nigeria and also on pages of Nigerian newspapers but there are no listed prices for large solar panels like in 100 Watts and above.

One might be able to easily find Solar embedded products in Nigeria than large stand alone solar panels. You'd be able to easily see things like Solar laptops, Solar mobile chargers, Solar TVs and so on. There are larger solar panels in the market but it's not in abundance as it seems not many people are importing it into Nigeria yet perhaps because Nigerians might not yet be willing to buy them at a high price.

Based on my estimation, the price of a 100 Watt Solar panel in Nigeria would be about $295(N50,000). It costs more as the number of Watts increase. Solar mobile chargers ore the cheapest and it can cost as little as $18(N3000) per unit.

NIPOST introduces N500 handling charge
by Felix Okoli

For people who love to shop on Chinese websites like Aliexpress or other global websites that normally ship to Nigeria through the postal mail, this may be bad news because it would ultimately increase their online shopping costs.

It's official! The Nigerian Postal Service a.k.a. NIPOST has recently introduced a flat handling charge for small parcels received from abroad. The receiver of the parcel would have to pay at least N500 before he collects his package. You would see the notice placed at a visible spot and close to the package collection center.

I recently went to the NIPOST office to collect a package I ordered for on Aliexpress.com. It was basically a 50,000maH power bank charger and if you are in Nigeria, you'd agree that one needs this stuff in a country where power supply is still insufficient. So, I found it for cheap on Aliexpress and it was priced at just $18 and this included the shipping to Nigeria. I chose to use postal mail shipping since it was the cheapest although it took about 30 days to get to me. I later got a notification from NIPOST to come for collection.

When I arrived NIPOST, I had to stay in line due to the fact that some other people there were also waiting for their package. We soon started discussing about the new handling charge and from our discussion, we resolved that the Nigerian factor has again come to play in NIPOST and one Oga at the Top was actually collecting and embezzling this money they are now collecting. I also got to know that most of us bought our items from Aliexpress.com and so it now seems that NIPOST is getting a lot of parcels lately, especially from China and so, might have just introduced these fees just to make money which may never get into the account of government. We could be wrong.

I was a bit surprised that a person has to pay money just to collect a parcel the sender has already sent and paid postage fees for. I remember the good old days when I used to use NIPOST and those were the days when we used to write letters to our parents from boarding school or to friends and we had to make use of postal mail services. Then you'd had to first write a letter, place it in an envelope and then go to the Post office to buy a Postal stamp so that the letter will be sent through NIPOST anywhere in Nigeria. With NIPOST, one could also send a letter to anywhere in the world but unlike online e-mail services which are delivered in seconds, it took a much longer time. It just seems that NIPOST is just looking for newer avenues to start making more money since people no longer patronized their once popular postal mail system for sending letters as they used to and stamps are becoming less attractive.

Anyway, I wasn't sure if I was going to have to pay the fee but I decided to pay it just to save my time and as long I'm also issued an official receipt for it. When it reached my turn, the guy confirmed that I would also have to pay the N500 flat handling charge on my single parcel weighing just less than 0.5kg. Well, I didn't mind paying since it would still save me money unlike if I were to have bought the item from most of these local online shopping websites we now have in Nigeria. A 50,000mah Power bank in the Nigerian market costs about N15,000 while If I were to use this Aliexpress to Nipost method, it would save me about N8,000.

After making the N500 handling charge payment to the NIPOST staff, he issued a receipt and also gave me my parcel. We tried to complain to the management of NIPOST but after asking the staff there who the Oga at the top was, nobody was willing to show us his office and no one was really willing to provide us with answers why we have to pay a fee to collect a parcel at NIPOST when the sender has already paid fees.

With this new system of increasing charges when using NIPOST for receiving items, it seems customers of NIPOST may just have to consider the new N500 handling charge as part of the costs associated with collecting a parcel and for Aliexpress shoppers who use NIPOST, they just have to include the additional cost to their online shopping costs. I also heard that the N500 was just for smaller packages but that the costs would increase for larger packages since other things such as custom charges would be included.

I guess one would have to consider the profitability of using NIPOST in the future when next one decides to receive a parcel in Nigeria. One would alos have to consider the time delay it took in getting the parcel through them. If both variables are favourable, then it would be wise to continue using NIPOST to receive parcels in Nigeria from Aliexpress. Other options would have to be using courier services like DHL and Fedex since they deliver faster. There is also the option of shopping on Amazon rather than Aliexpress if it would make better sense.

The best way to completely     wipe your Android device

The default data wipe tool in Android may not be enough to permanently eliminate personal data on your old device.

• by Dan Graziano 
   @DanGraziano

A study from security software vendor Avast has suggested that the factory reset option built into the Android operating system isn't effective in eradicating your personal data from old devices. The firm purchased 20 used Android smartphones on eBay and was able to recover more than 40,000 photos, 750 emails and text messages, and 250 contacts, along with the identities of four of the previous device owners, and even a completed loan application. To make matters worse, Avast employees were using readily available data recovery software to get the job done.

While Avast and other companies like it offer data deletion tools, there are other steps you can take to securing your personal data when performing a factory reset.

Step one: Encrypting

I recommend encrypting your device before you are getting ready to wipe it. The encryption process will scramble the data on your device and, even if the wipe doesn't fully delete the data, a special key will be required to unscramble it.

To encrypt your device, enter settings, click on Security, and select Encrypt phone.

Step two: Perform a factory reset

The next thing you will want to do is perform a factory reset. This can be done by selecting Factory data reset in the Backup & reset option in the settings menu. You should be aware that this will erase all of the data on your phone and that you should backup anything you don't want to lose.

Step three: Load dummy data

Following step one and two should be enough for most people, but there's an extra step you can take to add another layer of protection when erasing your personal data. Try loading fake photos and contacts on your device. Why you ask? We will address that in the next step.

Step four: Perform another factory reset

You should now perform another factory reset, thus erasing the dummy content you loaded onto the device. This will make it even harder for someone to locate your data because it will be buried below the dummy content.

Still feeling a little paranoid? Repeat steps three and four as many times as you like. As I mentioned above, though, for most people simply following steps one and two should be enough. Without the encryption pin, which is overwritten in the initial factory reset, it will be almost impossible to unscramble your data.

Then again, you could always take a hammer to your phone or toss it in the toilet. You know, if you aren't interested in selling it.