Sustainable energy for the whole world Leah Victorino July 2015 Your family is about to cook dinner at home. Then, you plan to finish some work from the office while kids do homework, and finally relax by watching T.V. when the power goes out. You check the breaker. That doesnt work. You call the power company on your cell phone. They tell you the line in your neighborhood went down and it will be prepared by morning. How does this affect your plan for the evening? Until the power returns, you are without: Lights Stove & microwave Refrigerator (should remain closed) Computer, T.V., & radio Heat or A/C What are your options? Get out flashlights and candles Make PB&J or go out to eat Go to the library to finish work and homework Get extra blankets to keep warm or go to a movie to keep cool Wait till morning and resume business as usual While a brief power outage in the U.S. may be considered fairly inconvenient, it will rarely have a negative impact on our lives overall. However, in many places around the world people experience rolling blackouts daily, or worse, have no access to electricity in their community at all. Imagine how this affects their productivity and quality of life. Billions of people worldwide lack modern energy, leading to: Significant time and energy spent collecting firewood or other biomass fuel for cooking and heating, often by women and children in unsafe conditions (Study in Zambia showed women spent 800 hours per year) Natural resources destroyed and pollution of environment Children taken out of school to complete time-consuming chores, or limited hours of daylight to study for children who remain in school Inability to work in trades that require light resulting in loss of potential income Source: Infrastructure shortfalls cost women time and opportunity, International Center for Research on Women PRIMARY BENEFITS Light (1.2 billion people) Increased ability to work and study during dark hours A considerable portion of already small incomes spent on candles, kerosene lamps Efficient cooking & heating (3 billion people) Hours spent collecting firewood, often women Decreased deforestation from firewood collection Decreased health risks from smoke inhalation, physical toil of firewood collection, burns from open fire Decreased pollution by black carbon and methane Other benefits: Refrigeration food security, improved health facilities/medicine Leisure & Communication radio, TV, cell phone charging capabilities SOURCE: WHO Factsheet 292, 2014 We can do this by: Taking conscientious action in our own communities to live sustainably Providing opportunities for those who must choose survival over sustainability Investing in the present and the future Empowering others to join us Photo attribution: Candle light, Devilal Collecting firewood, Francis Hannaway One planet, unityvector.blogspot.com "Solar-Panel-Cooker-in-front-of-hut" by Tom Sponheim - Transferred from en.wikipedia. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Solar-Panel- Cooker-in-front-of-hut.jpg#/media/File:Solar-Panel-Cooker-in-front-of- hut.jpg Tortillera en Guatemala, Andrew Hass