Sunday, September 14, 2014

Working Towards a Solar Lighting Project

Since learning of the failure to secure the CRCID grant, we have refocused our efforts towards providing solar lighting for all the 1200 students at the 6 schools in the Ndandini/Kyaithani area of Kenya.

Solar technology is changing rapidly and there are many new lights available at quite reasonable prices (although even a $10 light is beyond what most villagers in Ndandini can afford).

When we installed the first solar lights at the Kyaithani Secondary School in 2012, students began comning to school at 4am to study.  As we move towards providing lighting for primary school students, encouraging them to come to school at 4am is not ideal.

Sun King Eco solar lantern by Greenlight PlanetSo we are looking to provide each of the 1200 students with their own individual solar light that they can use at home for reading and studying.

Before we launch this big project, we are going to undertake a smaller pilot project to determine the benefits of this approach.

Jan & Terry will be going to Kenya in late September and will introduce the solar lighting pilot project and provide some initial solar lights for the trial project.

Stay tuned for updates on this new project and direction.