The off-grid technology hub at the Alfoura School in southern Israel. (Photo courtesy)
In a groundbreaking development in solar energy, a school in a Bedouin village without access to Israel’s electricity or water service has become a model for off-grid sustainable living.
There are approximately 300,000 Bedouins living in Israel in seven towns and 46 villages in the Negev Desert. Of these, about 35 villages remain unrecognized by the State of Israel and, therefore, are not connected to infrastructure. As a result, they lack access to essential municipal services, such as connection to the national electricity grid, the water company and sanitation.
Israel has not recognized these communities due to a lack of documentation among Bedouin residents, a problem dating back to the Ottoman Empire affecting approximately 30% of the Bedouin population.
The school now provides a model for what is possible when the power of the sun is harnessed, offering a way forward for other villages stuck without services in Israel and all over the world.
The pilot project was launched in the village of Alfoura, near the Beersheva-Arad Highway. Its completion was announced at the second conference of the Jewish-Bedouin NGO “Shamsuna” in Rahat.
Fareed Mahameed of the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies has said this technological development could help over 70% of the world’s population cope with the effects of climate change, according to the Times of Israel.
Shamshuna, chaired by solar energy pioneers and activists Yossi Abramowitz and Raid Abu-Alkian, has collaborated with the Arava Institute, the Atid educational network, and the Israel-Jewish Charitable Association (ICA) on the groundbreaking project.
The Times of Israel delineated the new equipment installed: The school now boasts its own greenhouse and five off-grid facilities, including a solar-driven and scalable plug-and-play unit using bacteria and algae to recycle wastewater for use in crop irrigation; agro-voltaic solar panels to help crops grow while producing solar energy; batteries to store the energy when there is no sunshine; a unit that converts organic waste into methane gas for cooking and fertilizer; and Israeli Watergen machines that provide clean drinking water from the air.
The tech site described as the “hub,” serves four classrooms, where students can access solar energy data via an application on their phones. They can grow plants, experiment with fertilizers from waste, cook with methane gas, and learn the differences between using regular versus recycled wastewater.
Drinking water and electricity are readily available at all times, even in the absence of the sun.
Unrecognized Bedouin villages like Alfoura may not be connected to Israeli infrastructure, but the Israeli Ministry of Education guarantees the right to education, creating a window of opportunity to legally provide power.
At the Alfoura school, there has been an exception made due to a building permit granted in 1974, enabling the installation of solar panels. However, other villages remain reliant upon diesel generators that cause air and noise pollution, an issue environmental advocacy group Adam Teva V’Din and other NGOs are challenging in a High Court petition. Similarly, Shamsuna is pushing to eliminate the requirement for building permits for solar panel installations.
Michael Macchia, an expert in energy and renewables, has suggested that it’s possible to install solar panels without permits.
“The solutions exist, and the state knows how to use them. We’ve already done this in kibbutzim, and in buildings constructed illegally in ultra-Othodox Jewish neighborhoods and by Palestinians in East Jerusalem. You just need to get the right authorities to create the ecosystem that will allow implementation of the vision.”
A self-assembled solar power system, not connected to the national electricity system, seen in the Bedouin village of Naqab, southern Israel, September 8, 2013. (Photo: Dudu Greenspan/Flash90)
Approximately 233,000 dunams (58,000 acres) of land in Bedouin areas have been identified as having the potential to be used as photovoltaic solar fields, according to Dorit Hochner , who oversees physical planning at the Energy Ministry.
Hochner announced that the process of swapping generators for solar panels has already begun and will take an additional six months. Solar technology could be implemented on a far wider scale if the issues of permits and ownership can be resolved.
Iris Berkowitz, head of infrastructure at the Southern Region Planning Authority, confirmed that an additional three solar fields were already approved on Bedouin land.
This new development in solar power may not only provide energy and water solutions for off-grid villages but may also provide incentives for the State of Israel to find solutions to the deadlock of unrecognized Bedouin land.
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