[MCN] Rural areas have hard time going off-grid with solar

[Lance Olsen]

Off-grid power in remote areas will require special business model to succeed
OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY
Public Release: 5-Jan-2017

Low-cost, off-grid solar energy could provide significant economic 
benefit to people living in some remote areas, but a new study 
suggests they generally lack the access to financial resources, 
commercial institutions and markets needed to bring solar electricity 
to their communities.

JOURNAL
Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032116309315
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"We describe the "landscape trap" concept, whereby entire landscapes 
are shifted into, and then maintained (trapped) in, a highly 
compromised structural and functional state as the result of mul- 
tiple temporal and spatial feedbacks between human and natural 
disturbance regimes. The landscape trap concept builds on ideas like 
stable alternative states and other relevant concepts, but it 
substantively expands the conceptual thinking in a number of unique 
ways. In this paper, we (i) review the literature to develop the 
concept of landscape traps, including their general features; (ii) 
provide a case study as an example of a landscape trap from the 
mountain ash (Eucalyptus regnans) forests of southeastern Australia; 
(iii) suggest how landscape traps can be detected before they are 
irrevocably established; and (iv) present evidence of the generality 
of landscape traps in different ecosystems worldwide."

David B. Lindenmayer et al. Newly discovered landscape traps produce 
regime shifts in wet forests PNAS Early Edition 
www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1110245108
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"Predicting changes in forests confronts three major sources of 
uncertainty: predicting weather and climate, predicting tree species' 
responses, and predicting changes in factors modifying the trees' 
responses (e.g., pathogens, insects, and fire). Challenges in 
predicting weather exist because climate projection models differ and 
downscaling climate is difficult, particularly where weather stations 
are sparse. Challenges in predicting responses of individual tree 
species to climate are a result of species competing under a climate 
regime that we have not seen before and they may not have experienced 
before. .... Despite the uncertainty, some trends are more likely 
than others. We present estimates of the relative species composition 
of future forests in British Columbia."

Fred L. Bunnell & Laurie L. Kremsater. Migrating Like a Herd of Cats: 
Climate Change and Emerging Forests in British Columbia. Journal of 
Ecosystems and Management 13(2):1-24 2012.