Total South Africa lights the way with safe, affordable solar-powered lights
Awango by Total lights rely 100% on the sun for power and come with their own mini self-sustaining solar panel. All the products in the range provide superior light intensity and are safer than candles and paraffin. Some even include cellphone charging capabilities, which is particularly beneficial for people living without electricity.
Johannesburg – “Our aim is that these lights help those households that do not have access to electricity or to a consistent or reliable power supply. We want to enable school children living in remote areas to do their homework at night, and parents to safely prepare food for their families. We also want to provide people living in informal settings with a safer option to candles and paraffin,” says Total South Africa’s Managing Director, Christian des Closières.
There are three products in the range: the S20 D.Light solar lantern, the S300 D.Light solar lantern and the Sundaya T-Light Kit that includes up to four individual bayonet lamps.
The S20 D.Light is a simple solar lantern with a built-in polycrystalline solar panel and li-ion battery in the top and a 50 000-hour LED light inside. After a full day’s charge it lasts between four and eight hours, depending on the brightness setting used. There are two brightness settings – ‘standard’ for general light and ‘high’ for a brighter light (for homework and reading). The lantern can be hung up or used standing on a flat surface. The battery can also be charged via a power point using a small (2mm) Nokia phone charger.
A bigger lantern, the S300 D.Light comes with a built-in NiMH battery, 50 000-hour LED light and separate, weather-resistant solar panel (not built-in to the lantern). It can charge up to five different types of cellphones (cellphone adapters included) and offers four brightness settings – high (studying and precision work), medium (cooking and working), low (socialising) and bed light (resting and sleeping). On ‘high’ you can read and work easily up to one metre from the lamp and within a two metre radius (two to three people). A full day’s charge lasts between four and 100 hours depending on the setting used. The battery can also be charged via a power point using a small (2mm) Nokia phone charger.
The Sundaya T-Light Kit is a solar home system that can be expanded gradually. It comes with its own solar panel, up to four bayonet lamps, connection hub (linking the lamps to the solar panel), and four cellphone adapters. Unlike the solar lanterns, this system doesn’t have a battery and allows you to put the solar panel on or next to the roof of your house outside and connect the lamps directly into the system inside. Sundaya T-Lights offer three brightness settings – high (precision work), medium (studying/cooking) and low (socialising). The system can be expanded upon by buying additional kits and connecting these into the existing hubs, effectively allowing you to bring light into every room of your home. A full days’ charge lasts between six and 60 hours, depending on the setting used.
The Awango by Total range is available through all Total forecourts across the country as well as through selected NGOs, including the Federation of Urban and Rural Poor (FEDUP) and the Informal Settlement Network (ISN). FEDUP is made up of savings collectives throughout South Africa, while ISN is a bottom-up agglomeration of settlement-level and national-level organisations of the poor.
These two organisations, through the uTshani Fund – a formal bridging finance institution that provides loans for community-led initiatives – aim to make Awango lights available to the communities in which they operate through affordable payment plans. In homes without electricity, the average household lighting cost is R3 per day during summer and R5 per day during winter for the purchase of candles or paraffin. This equates to roughly R1 100 per year.
FEDUP has initiated an idea to afford its savings members the opportunity to purchase Awango solar lights through a cost-effective repayment plan of R3 per day. The benefits to the members are three-fold: safety (particularly to the aged and children who are most vulnerable when exposed to burning candles); savings (after the light has been paid off); and an income generation opportunity (charging cellphones for other community members at a nominal fee).
Another plan in the pipeline is a pilot project by FEDUP and ISN to spearhead a ‘candleless settlement’. Here a small settlement of around 300 people will be targeted and mobilised to purchase a solar light on the instalment method with the intention of eliminating the use of all other forms of lighting. The project will involve government and other stakeholders, and will ultimately aim to demonstrate that informal settlements can achieve a state of ‘candlelessness’ so as to eliminate all potential hazards associated with shack fires.
By partnering with NGOs in this way, the Awango by Total project utilises a novel approach to its ‘last mile’ distribution, which includes the training of unemployed South Africans who will be empowered to sell the products in their communities.
“We believe that because of the likely popularity of the Awango range of products, this project has the potential to create new jobs opportunities through the selling and distribution process,” says Total South Africa’s General Manager: Specialities, Chris Walkinshaw.
