Wind Energy

Oman should look at solar power and wind energy

Oman’s oil reserves may last only for another 40 years and the country should start looking at alternative energy sources, like wind power and solar energy, said Thomas Blaschke, professor of Geoinformatics at the University of Salzburg and deputy director at Centre for Geoinformatics in Austria.

"Fossil fuel based economies face a difficult future and all such countries should invest in alternative and sustainable energy sources," he said while delivering a lecture on ‘Sustainable energy: Modelling and monitoring of energy demand and supply’ at GUtech recently.

According to Blaschke, solar power and wind energy are the best alternatives to conventional energy and countries like Germany are investing heavily in green energy. "Solar power is a good alternative to conventional energy in this part of the world."

The expert, however, was sceptical about viability and technological limitations when it comes to large scale production and transmission of energy generated from alternative sources. "Cost is an obstacle and we also need to have better technologies to store power generated from photovoltaic solar energy systems, which convert light energy into electricity."

On the use of biogas energy, Blaschke said that organic waste used to generate energy works well in environments like in villages where they generate and utilise the energy. "On a global scale, it is not good enough." He added that Geographic Information Systems have been widely used for the better management of electricity distribution system.

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