The Solar PV Project - 2019-22

Costa Rica is a country with breathtaking landscapes that are worth visiting. In our latest project, we aimed to aid one of the few remaining indigenous populations in the country by reaching deep into the jungles of Costa Rica.

The people of Cero Azul live several hours southeast of the capital, San Jose, approximately 35 km into the rainforest. They have lived without electricity since their inception 75 years ago. Due to the community's poverty, they cannot afford luxuries like solar energy, basic power, or even a refrigerator. Many parents walk for hours a day to plantations and work 12+ hour days for approximately $5 a week.

Within the community of approximately 200 inhabitants, around 50 children attend school in the main schoolhouse five days a week. Many children as young as 5 walk alone 1-2 hours to school from the surrounding foothills. They are often left at home alone while their parents leave for work for the day and, more often than not, have little or no food on any given day.

In addition to these hardships, the school and community need electricity, which hinders students from keeping up with modern education that uses computers, the internet, and other modern tools. As a result, older children going off to high school in more urban areas return in defeat, needing to learn how to do the most straightforward tasks using modern electronics.

Winds of Change collaborated with our partners RJI on the ground to propose a Solar PV System for the community centre/school. Our latest student group, consisting of 4th-year engineering students from the University of Toronto, travelled to the community in the fall to evaluate the need before COVID-19 began.

Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, the project was put on hold until 2022, when we could finally get back to the task. We worked to re-establish the project and raise funds with a very generous donation from the Compassionate Eye Foundation and private donors.

Ultimately, we raised enough funds to travel down again in November 2022 and finally install the system for the community. We successfully installed a 10 kW Solar PV system that provides enough power for all classroom needs, including computers, projects, charging of electronics, lighting, satellite internet, and enough power to run their donated fridge for the community to store food and make frozen treats.

Please see below for some of the many photos from our experience.