US ecological award for Indian organisations

The Sierra Club, the oldest and largest grassroots environmental organisation in the US, has announced the winners of its first ever “Green Energy
& Green Livelihoods Achievement Award” for India. Two organisations share the award – Ecosphere Spiti from the mountainous Himachal Pradesh valley named Spiti in the trans-Himalayas, and Barefoot College in Rajasthan, led by social entrepreneur Bunker Roy. The only fully solar-electrified institution, Barefoot College has trained rural men and women as Barefoot Solar Engineers (BSEs). They have built and installed solar units in 10,000 households, covering 574 villages across 16 Indian states. Each award carries a prize money of Rs 20 lakh and a trophy to be presented at the awards ceremony in Mumbai on July 30. The award represents Sierra Club’s growing interest in building international partnerships to address climate change mitigation and adaptation. The award recognizes community initiatives to promote green economic development, adaptation of renewable energy alternatives and organizational leadership in a grassroots environmental campaign. Ecosphere Spiti has won the award for successfully creating sustainable livelihoods linked to conservation and eco-tourism, while Barefoot College has applied practical, traditional knowledge and community-owned sustainable technology to reach the poorest residents of the impoverished desert state. Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope said, “We set out on this path more than a century ago by promoting conservation awareness through mountain outings in the United States. We are delighted to recognise Ecosphere Spiti because it so clearly shares our own ideals for protecting a nation’s cultural and natural heritage for future generations.” Sierra Club International Programs director Stephen Mills had equally effusive praise for the Barefoot College: “As much as we are interested in sharing resources and supporting environmental leadership in India, we have also come to listen and learn,” Mills said. “We believe that much of the important energy and environmental work happening now in India has exciting applications in the US. Bunker Roy’s amazing record of teaching a community’s most disadvantaged members to become solar engineers is a prime example. We are not the first, and we will not be the last, to recognise this astonishingly scalable and replicable model for creating green livelihoods,” Mills added. Barefoot College is also the only fully solar-electrified college based in a village in India. Starting in 1989, barefoot solar engineers have installed a total of 40 kilowatts of solar panes and five battery banks, each containing 136 deep-cycle batteries. The solar components (inverters, charge controllers, battery boxes, stands) were all fabricated in the college itself. “We are delighted, honored and humbled by this award,” said Bunker Roy. “The recognition is to Mahatma Gandhi, ‘The Last Man’ who has shown the simple way of how to respect the Earth.”