16. Development of Cold Storage Powered by Pico Hydropower

In view of demand to design and promote a solution empowering farmers to preserve their crops, a low-cost cold storage unit was designed and developed by RuTAG, IIT Roorkee which could help farmers for better preservation of fruits and vegetables for a long period. In addition, the Himalayan region and mountain areas of the country are endowed with natural water falls, streams and rivers flowing down the hills. The present paper discusses the installation of a cold storage unit powered by Pico hydropower, installed in the remote area of Uttarakhand. It is observed that the wastage of locally grown fruits and vegetables due to non-existence of appropriate cold storage facilities vary from 10 to 50%. As a result, farmers sell most of their fruits and vegetables to the market immediately at low prices due to absence of proper storage and preserving facilities. In order to power the cold storage for local food processing, the hydro energy is good alternative source in rural mountains areas where large potential in water at small scale are available. Such Pico hydropower plants can be used to power a chain of cold storage units to develop the required facilities of storage for off-season vegetable and fruits. The integration of micro hydropower with cold storage is economically viable and feasible solution for un-electrified remote areas or villages. In view of above, a Pico hydropower-based cold storage unit is successfully installed and tested in the field and discussed in this paper.