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Amongst, many other trips, we were in a village in Antioquia, which was also badly affected by the violence 20 years ago. We talked to the leader of the village, a 46-year-old woman, whom with no economical means has been educating peasants and others in the community to protect and conserve this beautiful natural reserve and the environment. The village has beekeeping, rivers, waterfalls, beautiful views, plants, great organic agricultural potential, and animals that are now at risk of extinction; they are unable to progress as there is no electricity. This case is repeated in several villages in Antioquia and Colombia.
Water stream, photo taken during visit to village La Linda.
Averagely speaking, a family consisting of 3 or 4 people will require at least 4 solar panels to generate energy with the quality and quantity that is required. This is one of the many examples in which the cost of technology does not allow families or communities to obtain one of the basic needs of the 21st C, and when they are offered, they are limited which generates frustration for the end-user.
As an interesting data point, 98% of the households interviewed across stratum 1 & 2, expressed that if given the opportunity they would want to develop a skill in the Solar PV sector. In stratum 6, household jobs were engineers, lawyers, doctors and executives. Similarly, when we asked the same question to those in stratum 6, they were eager to switch to other alternatives that represent cheaper options, while at the same time keen to contribute to the environment through such implementation.
The common sentiment from those that participated in our study, expressed that the roll out of such technology has been extremely slow and expensive for residential areas, where businesses or industries have been the focus of local companies and 3rd parities offering Solar PV solutions. This makes the residential area an untapped market, bringing a huge growth opportunity benefiting thousands of families across all strata in the city and who are hungry to find ways to decarbonise through affordable Solar PV solutions.
With energy comes connectivity and with internet comes the potential for millions of people to attain education for free, in skills that are most interesting to them, making them the entrepreneurs of the future.