Access to electricity can be a challenge when you and your family live together on a small fishing boat. You pull out early in the morning so that you can provide fish to the morning market. And when you do, you lose access to the main electricity grid. Many families will only reconnect to the grid when they moor for the night, manually reconnecting the wires themselves.
When moored, families connect directly to the grid.
Not having a reliable source of power, makes some things most of us take for granted very difficult. It is impossible to
- boil and purify water
- access clean-cooking solutions (and so are exposed to dangerous levels of air pollution)
- study after dark
So that families can access electricity when out fishing, or otherwise unable to connect to the grid, H4H partnered with DOVE Fund, and yesterday, March 4th provided a clean, solar-powered solution to the community of 15 boats. We provided each family with a solar panel, a battery and four light bulbs. With the sun beating down in tropical Hue, these solar panels will provide sufficient lighting for the whole family. They also have an outlet for charging phones and other electronic devices.
Finally, now that children in the community have access to a clean, reliable energy source, we hope that they will borrow even more books from our special Motorbike Book Club! H4H has been supporting the MBC since its inception in 2016, when it began lending books and providing life skill lessons in Thuy Phu fishing village.
The Vietnamese government has made great progress in extending grid coverage. Our off-grid, clean energy solution is an effective complement in a community grid extension cannot serve.
Hearts for Hue would like to thank the local People’s Committee and the fishing village leaders for their logistical support. We would also like to thank DOVE Fund for generously funding the programme.
