Solar Buddy Social Justice initiative
Energy Poverty is a major global issue; one which many of us have not deeply considered. As part of our responsibility as global citizens, it is important that we educate ourselves about issues such as these and consider how we can help. To that end, the following presentation was given to the entire school community at an assembly earlier this term:
Nearly 10% of the world’s population live in energy poverty, meaning they have access to little or no energy. There are 789 million people in the world who live without access to an electricity connection. So, when the sun goes down, they are plunged into darkness. From the shanty-towns in Sub-Saharan Africa to the sprawling slums in India and even just a few kilometres away from our own country in Papua New Guinea, night time brings with it a noxious ritual of candles, gas lamps and fires. Energy poverty is a major problem! Without reliable energy, many facets of life are impacted.
Apart from not having the convenience we all enjoy every single day, fuel-powered energy is dangerous, expensive and not very bright. Imagine living in a home where the indoor air pollution is so bad that your family are getting very ill and maybe even dying. This is happening to 4 million people every year. Fuel-based lighting also leads to damaging carbon emissions which pollutes our environment and we all know about the dreadful effects of that. No wonder they call it dirty energy!
Imagine for a minute, what it would be like if you had gone home last night and not been able to use any electricity. At first you might feel slightly excited that you couldn’t do your homework. But, what if you had a major assignment due this morning, or a test. Or what if it was the night before your HSC and you couldn’t study? This is what many children around the world are faced with and their educational outcomes and opportunity to pull themselves and their community out of this energy poverty crisis are severely limited. It all sounds pretty grim. And it is! But we can help. YOU can help!
We are teaming up with Origin Energy Foundation who have very generously offered to sponsor us to work on a Solar Buddy light building project. We are looking for students who would like to learn more about energy poverty and then work together to build a solar light and write a personal letter to the children who will receive it .
We plan to build 50 lights and write 50 accompanying letters to send to children in Papua New Guinea, which is just 3.7km off Australia’s coastline. However, 78% of people in PNG do not have electricity and are, therefore, in significant energy poverty.
Next, we engaged volunteers from Origin Energy Foundation, led by Jelena Faine, mother of Mila, our passionate Environment Prefect. Mila organised a presentation at lunchtime and invited all students to come along and find out more about energy poverty and what we can do to help those in need. Many students came along to the event and then stayed into the afternoon to assemble lights and write to the recipients.
Finally, we continued to raise awareness of this important issue with our wider community as part of Domremy’s Light Festival. Student volunteers, led wonderfully by Mila and Aoife, our Humanities Prefect, assisted younger children and their parents with assembly, while talking to them about this important global issue.
We are very proud of Mila and Aoife’s leadership of this initiative and all students who gave their time to become more aware as global citizens and make a difference. Thank you to Ms Peros and Mr Tsanidis for their support and fine assembly skills. We built 50 lights which will be delivered to children and communities in Papua New Guinea and the bucket which is used to transport these will also assist the community as a water filter.
We would like to thank Jelena and the team of volunteers from Origin Energy Foundation for their financial and personal support throughout this project. We hope to maintain this relationship and continue to make a difference in the lives of those in need.
Ms Sarah Thompson, Leader of Innovative and Global Connections
