Across the Pacific and Timor-Leste, solar power is transforming lives, providing reliable electricity for health centres, schools, water systems and community hubs that people depend on every day.
As we charge ahead with our countdown to #COP30, we’re showcasing projects supported by the Australian Government through REnew Pacific and earlier pilots under the Business Partnerships Platform’s (BPP) Off-Grid Renewable Energy Partnerships. An incredible 94% of these projects are solar, bringing clean, renewable energy to essential services across the region.
In Vanuatu, Respond Global, through its unique HELPR-1 vessel, is powering ahead with one of REnew Pacific’s first projects, installing 20 new off-grid solar power systems and upgrading a further 20 health facilities across all six provinces. With support from Vanuatu’s National Green Energy Fund (NGEF), the project is also supplying medical equipment, repairing and upgrading systems in schools and clinics, removing e-waste and training local community members to maintain the systems. Launched in February, it is already more than halfway through, with five health facilities in Sanma Province electrified last month alone, together serving more than 11,700 people. Find out more here.
Over in Solomon Islands, families across Guadalcanal now have reliable, solar-powered healthcare they can count on, day and night at the Good Samaritan Hospital. A BPP partnership between Superfly and the hospital, completed late last year, has created a cleaner, more resilient system that now supplies 97.3% of the hospital’s energy needs. Hundreds of patients now treated safely at night, while savings from reduced diesel use – 19,000 litres to date – have been reinvested into new facilities, including a non-communicable disease extension for foot care and a soon-to-open eye clinic. Find out more here.
In Papua New Guinea, more than 300 students, teachers and family members at the remote Kokoda College now benefit from reliable, renewable energy thanks to a solar mini-grid launched in March through a BPP partnership with KTF (Kokoda Track Foundation). The system is powering classrooms, an IT lab with disability assistive technologies, a solar water pump, a waste incinerator and an irrigation system that supports climate-smart agriculture on the campus. Find out more here.
In Fiji, school children on Rabi Island are enjoying more reliable energy and internet access thanks to a solar system and satellite connection installed late last year at Buakonikai Primary School through a BPP partnership with Its Time Foundation. The upgrade is transforming learning outcomes, ensuring students can study with consistent power for lights and computers. Find out more here and check out this short film about its impact.
These sun-powered initiatives are all part of the Pacific Climate Infrastructure Financing Partnership (PCIFP), a $350million initiative for climate infrastructure in the region delivered by the Australian Government’s Australian Infrastructure Financing Facility for the Pacific (AIFFP) and implemented by Palladium.
Follow along each week as we share a new story on the road to Belém.
