Posted on October, 08 2014

WWF Kenya has launched the Clean Energy Village Initiative (CEVI) in Kwale County, which aims to address broader climate change, and energy footprint issues in the County. The initiative was launched on 18th September 2014 and is targeting communities and institutions to address their immediate energy access needs. This pilot initiative in Kwale is part of a 3-year project funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation (SIDA), which will later be expanded to other villages and counties, and will focus on lighting, cooking and promotion of tree planting. The Guest of Honour was the Kwale County Executive in charge of Natural Resources, Lands and Mining. Others who graced the occasion included the Kwale County Commissioner and his Deputy, area Member of Parliament and Member of County Assembly, representatives from Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), Kenya Forestry Service (KFS), BASE Titanium, Barefoot Power, representatives of Kaya Elders, officials of the Kaya Kinondo Financial Services Association (KFSA), community members and the WWF Kenya team led by the Country Director.

Announcing the launch in Fihoni village, Kinondo sub-location, WWF Kenya Country Director called on the national and county governments, together with the private sector and civil society organisations to support the initiative and facilitate access to renewable energy solutions in Kwale County, since no single entity on its own can address all the energy and climate change related issues in the country. He added that The Clean Energy Village Initiative has been launched to address serious challenges that emerged from a rapid assessment conducted by WWF in three villages in Kwale County, and which revealed that an overwhelming majority (80%) depend on paraffin (or a combination of paraffin and firewood) for lighting and firewood as a source of cooking energy.

These fuels cause indoor air pollution leading to respiratory diseases and eye irritation. Furthermore, the paraffin lamps do not create conducive atmosphere for school going children to study in the evenings. The use of wood fuel has also led to massive deforestation. As a result, WWF Kenya has introduced solar lanterns for lighting with additional benefit of phone charging, and will later introduce appropriately designed energy saving cook stoves expected to reduce indoor air pollution, pressure on forests, and free time used in search of wood fuel. Tree planting is an important component of this initiative and WWF Kenya aims to achieve this through working with community conservation groups.

Since majority of the community members cannot afford to buy the lanterns at the counter, WWF Kenya is using a revolving fund approach in which the capital cost of acquiring the solar lanterns and energy saving cook stoves are met upfront from a revolving fund set up for this purpose and will be managed by a community owned village bank, the Kaya Kinondo Financial Services Association (KFSA). The Country Director announced that WWF Kenya has financed the revolving fund by providing solar lanterns worth Kshs 1,000,000 to be sold out by the village bank through a loan scheme and the proceeds go into the revolving fund. He added that for every solar lantern acquired by a community member or household WWF will provide one lantern for free for the first 300 lanterns sold.

Another sustainability aspect of CEVI is that WWF, in partnership with Barefoot Power, has facilitated training of 4 community youths as solar technicians to assist the solar lantern beneficiaries with simple repair and maintenance work and will continue to facilitate training of more technicians as need may arise and as the initiative expands.