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Renewable energy

Mountains play as key role in providing renewable energy, especially through hydropower, solar power, wind power and biogas for downstream cities and remote mountain communities.

Hydropower currently provides around a fifth of all electricity worldwide, and some countries rely almost exclusively on mountain regions for hydropower generation In Bolivia, Chile, Colombia and Peru, at least 95 percent of hydropower is generated in mountain regions.

Solar power can also be efficiently produced in mountains and other cold regions - contrary to popular belief. The Himalayas and Tropical Andes are particularly promising locations for the development of solar energy, where installations could produce approximately 20 percent more energy than they could at sea level. In Nepal, for example, almost all remote airports and telecommunication facilities are powered by solar energy; solar cookers are widely used in the mountain regions of China and India.

Wind power is a vast, but largely untapped source of potential sustainable energy in mountains. Even at lower elevations, the terrain and topography of mountains can create wind corridors with high wind speeds that are ideally suited for wind turbine development.

Sustainable energy brings benefits to human health, the mountain environment and global climate. Reduced dependency on firewood, for example, can lead to fewer respiratory diseases, improved water and soil conservation, and less black carbon (soot) in the atmosphere – one of the most widespread short-lived climate pollutants. However, many sustainable energy sources in mountains remain unused or underutilized.

Bringing solar power to medical centres in the Indian Himalayas during Covid-19

news

Global Himalayan Expedition (GHE) is providing solar power to health centres along with critical medical care equipment for remote communities of Ladakh and Meghalaya, India.

India has over 23 000 primary healthcare centres (PHC) and over 1 million medical sub-centres catering to 70 percent of the population. Health centres often...

Call for inputs: 2020 MPS Annual Report

peak to peak

The February 2021 issue of Peak to Peak opens with a call for Mountain Partnership members to submit inputs for the Secretariat's 2020 Annual Report. This month, the 'Members' Voices' section features Farmer Tantoh of the Save Your Future Association in Cameroon. Top news stories from January focus on governments in...

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Solar energy for the Mount Everest Sherpa Museum, a hospital and two schools

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A Reinhold Messner Foundation project aims at improving the sustainability of mountain tourism by bringing renewable solar energy to a museum, hospital and two schools in the Mount Everest region. The goal is to redesign the Solukhumbu Valley Namche Bazar Sherpa Culture Museum, the Kunde Sherpa Hospital in Khumjung,...

Overcoming marketing barriers of COVID-19 Webinar

peak to peak

The September 2020 issue of Peak to Peak highlights the first virtual Mountain Partnership Product (MPP) initiative webinars, which were held in English and Spanish. This month's Members' Voices is a Mountain Partnership Products producer story about Arabica coffee in Panama. Peak to Peak September highlights four top news stories from the...

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Elevating Mountains in the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework 2.0

publication

With the Aichi Biodiversity Targets coming to an end in 2020, the world is preparing for a new set of ambitious biodiversity targets and goals to follow. This brief, prepared for the second Open-Ended Working Group meeting on the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework in February 2020, highlights how mountains are...

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2020 Booklet of Good Practices for vibrant European mountains

publication

To celebrate the start of 2020, Euromontana – the European Association of Mountain Areas - published a new booklet of good practices. This brochure is the result of the exchange of good practices carried out by Euromontana in 2019 and aims at showcasing innovative initiatives for the development of...