Solar Energy Heroes

A list of people I admire in the Solar Energy Sector due to their outstanding contributions. Will keep on adding to this list as and when a new Hero is found!


Harish Hande

Hande co-founded SELCO INDIA (in 1995), a social enterprise, to eradicate poverty by promoting sustainable technologies in rural India. With its headquarters in Bangalore , SELCO has 25 branches in Karnataka and Gujarat. Today SELCO INDIA has installed solar lighting systems in over 120,000 households in the rural areas of these states.
Hande has won the Ashden Award for Sustainable Energy 2005 and Tech Museum Award 2005. Hande has also received the world’s leading green energy award from Prince Charles in 2005. In 2007 SELCO INDIA won the Outstanding Achievement Award from Ashden Awards. The award was presented by Al Gore, former Vice President of the United States of America. Hande was named the Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2007 by the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship and the Nand & Jeet Khemka Foundation. He was also the featured attendee and speaker at the Clinton Global Initiative 2007.
In 2008, Hande was chosen by Business Today as one of the 21 young leaders for India’s 21st century. In mid 2008, India Today named him one of the 50 pioneers of change in India.
He was awarded with Asia's prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for 2011, also sometimes referred to as Asia's Nobel Prize, for “his pragmatic efforts to put solar power technology in the hands of the poor, through his social enterprise SELCO India”.


Deepak Gadhia

Deepak Gadhia is a manufacturer of Scheffler concentrators and steam cooking systems, parabolic cookers, etc. He engineered and helped create large arrays of Scheffler concentrators for institutions, one of which at Tirupati, India, solar cooks 30,000 meals per day.







Sanjit 'Bunker' Roy

Sanjit 'Bunker' Roy (born 2 August 1945) is an Indian social activist and educator. In 1972 he founded the Barefoot college in Tilonia, Rajasthan. The Indian non-governmental organization was registered as the Social Work and Research Centre. He was selected as one of Time 100, the 100 most influential personalities in the world by TIME Magazine in 2010.

Turning grandmothers into solar engineers is one of Sanjit "Bunker" Roy's favorite jobs. "Solar is the answer".."The way to go about this is not a centralized grid system, which brings in power from hundreds of miles away," he says.
"It is to bring in basic light right down to the level of basic household wherein they take ownership and control over that technology."
Women are the focus for the solar power projects that the Barefoot College runs because men "were very untrainable," says Roy.
See this interesting Video on his unusual achievement



Damian Miller  - CEO, Orb Energy 

Damian is a US and UK national, and is the CEO of Orb. He has 10 years experience in the solar photovoltaic industry and holds a doctorate from Cambridge in solar technology in emerging markets. After finishing his PhD in 1998 he put his research findings into practice. He joined Shell, becoming Shell Solar's Director of Rural Operations and establishin solar subsidiaries in India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Indonesia. He also implemented a large-scale solar project in China and managed joint ventures in Morocco and South Africa. At the end of 2006 he set up Orb Energy in India. In just two years, Orb has become one of India's leading providers of solar energy solutions. Orb sells, installs and services solar systems across multiple states in India, with plans for further expansion. Damian Miller is known for his ability to pioneer and lead new solar companies in Asia, and is the author of the recently published book Selling Solar.

Jigar Shah - CEO, Carbon War Room

A renowned visionary, Jigar Shah is committed to renewable energy and sustainable solutions that enable prosperity beyond the carbon economy. As CEO of the Carbon War Room, Jigar is dedicated to indentifying business-as-usual practices and replacing them with low-carbon solutions. Prior to the Carbon War Room, Jigar founded SunEdison in 2003. Under his leadership, SunEdison revolutionized the solar industry by introducing a business model to sell solar as a service. The transformation to solar power service agreements is responsible for turning solar services into a multi-billion dollar industry. 
Jigar is also an expert on energy project finance, changing energy policy, working with entrenched stakeholders, and convincing individuals to embrace energy technology. He works closely with entrepreneurs, policymakers, and investors around the world to develop, incubate, and implement sustainable solutions that enable prosperity beyond the carbon economy. 
Jigar holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, and an MBA from the University of Maryland. Jigar sits on the boards of the Prometheus Institute for Sustainable Development, SB NOW, and Greenpeace USA.


Ashok Bhalotra - Director, Fews for more

Ashok Bhalotra is a visionary Indian architect and urban planner. After studying in India in the before mentioned areas, he worked in India and Kuwait. He then worked for four years in Paris at Woods & Candalis and Anatole Kopp.
Since 1971 he has worked for KuiperCompagnons, Office of Planning and Architecture in Rotterdam, functioning as its director. Apart from projects in the Netherlands, he has been involved in the planning of projects abroad. He is the designer of the national airport of Dubai sheikhdom, the King Saud University in Saudi Arabia and a town hall in New Delhi.He is particularly known for the Dutch neighbourhood Kattenbroek, a residential area of over 5,000 homes in the north of Amersfoort, also known as the 'City of the Sun', a revolutionary residential area that fully incorporates solar energy.