Solar PV and wind power for water pumping, both irrigation and drinking water, are gaining widespread acceptance, and many more projects and investments are occurring. On the order of one million mechanical wind pumps are in use for water pumping, primarily in Argentina, following decades of development. Large numbers of wind pumps are also used in Africa, including in South Africa (300,000), Namibia (30,000), Cape Verde (800), Zimbabwe (650), and several other countries (another 2,000). There are now more than 50,000 solar-PV pumps worldwide, many of these in India. Over 4,000 solar pumps (ranging from 200–2,000 W) were recently installed in rural areas as part of the Indian Solar PV Water Pumping Programme. There are an estimated 1,000 solar water pumps in use in West Africa. Donor programs for PV-powered drinking water have appeared in Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia, Jordan, Namibia, Niger, the Philippines, Tunisia, and Zimbabwe, among others.[N42]

A growing cohort of commercial projects for solar PVpowered drinking water, including both pumping and purifi- cation, has appeared in recent years, notably in India, the Maldives, and the Philippines. In the Maldives, a commercial pilot project anticipates sales of 1,000 liters/day, with a longterm delivered price of water to households expected to reach 0.2–0.5 cents per liter. Another recent example is on the Philippine island of Cebu. A 3-kW solar PV water pump distributes filtered and chlorinated surface water to 10 village locations. The 1,200 residents use prepaid debit cards to purchase potable water at a cost of about 3 PHP (5.5 cents) for 20 liters, or 0.3 cents/liter, a tenth of the cost of bottled water supplies. Fees collected from water sales are used to pay back an unsubsidized 10-year bank loan. The scheme could be duplicated on 10 more Philippine islands, providing potable water to 200,000 people in 40 municipalities.