#MeettheWomeninEnergySeries: Co-designing alternative energy solutions with communities to address their energy needs, meet Reshmi Wolvers
Reshmi Wolvers is a Senior Energy Analyst at GreenCape. She manages the Alternative Service Delivery Unit (ASDU) whose mandate is to ensure underserviced and unserviced communities have access to clean energy through innovative off-grid solutions. GreenCape is a non-profit organisation that supports the development of the green economy — one that is low carbon, resource efficient and socially inclusive. The organization is based in the Western Cape, South Africa. Prior to joining GreenCape, Reshmi worked at the Western Cape Provincial Government with the Energy Security Game Changer Team. In 2019, Reshmi was selected as a #InspiringFiftySA Winner for her innovative work expanding off-grid electricity to low-income communities.
Hi Reshmi, thank you so much for agreeing to speak to me and sharing your journey in the energy sector.
How would you describe your career path, and what have been some of your standout moments?
I graduated from architecture school back in 2013, so I guess the biggest surprise of my career is that I am not a practicing architect! That being said, as non-linear as my journey has been from an external perspective, there are core values and clear underlying passions that have guided and fueled my career.
There have been a few great moments in my career, but so far, my proudest moment was when the lights went on in Witsand! After a lot of effort, we finally have a network of wifi-enabled solar-powered streetlights operational in the community of Witsand in Atlantis, through a partnership with ThinkWifi. The impact this will achieve is really life-changing, so I’m really grateful to have been a cog in that wheel!
Do you have mentors and how did they inspire you in your career? In your view, what is the importance of having mentors?
I have never had any formal mentors, but I have been inspired by some of my seniors. I have been lucky enough to have incredible managers who have been patient with me and who have guided me in both tangible and often very intangible ways — usually just by their solid examples (and their willingness to admit when they fall off the path or be honest when they don’t know which path to take). Mentorship is most definitely a two-way relationship and an ongoing process. You learn as much as you ‘guide’, and being open to this sort of exchange is critical to growing in your career — whether it’s in a formalized structure or not.
Through the GreenCape Alternative Service Delivery Unit (ASDU), you are working with communities of Freedom Farm & Malawi Camp in Cape Town. Please tells more about the ASDU and the work you are doing with these two communities?
The ASDU is a community-led data-driven off-grid service delivery unit that oversees the design, facilitation and implementation of tailored service models that are financially sustainable, technically sound and socially inclusive for underserved or unserviceable communities. We are operational in three different communities: Witsand; Freedom Farm and Malawi Camp. In these communities, we have only considered alternative energy services, however, we are not closed to alternative water & sanitation or waste management services in the future. Based on an in-depth enumeration, mobilisation and co-design process with each community’s leadership teams, we co-designed solutions that will meet some of the pressing needs of the respective communities. This has ranged from education, to safety, to lighting and keeping phones charged long enough to be able to respond to recruiters!
How important are partnerships in the work you doing with ASDU? Who are you partnering with and what do they bring to the table?
In any co-designed process, the solutions are only as useful as the quality of engagement and partnership with the relevant community. The ASDU partners with service providers who have experience at the base of the pyramid in providing either social, technical or financial services (or a combination of these). The ASDU also partners with funding institutions, corporates or governments who have an interest in providing communities with services that they need but also want.
In the community of Witsand, we have partnered with ThinkWifi to provide Wi-Fi enabled solar powered streetlights using an innovative business model centred around advertising. In the communities of Freedom Farm and Malawi Camp, we have partnered with The iShack Project to provide solar home systems that can power lighting, small DC appliances and which comes with a battery. These communities will be relocated, so the service needs to accommodate such a condition.
I know you are passionate about addressing gender inequality in the energy sector. How are you addressing gender inequality while providing energy services to unserviced and unserviceable communities?
Two things that are typically interlinked around the world is poverty and gender inequality — the poorer a community is, the more likely that womxn in that community are disempowered. At the same time, access to reliable, affordable energy is seen globally as a lever for economic growth; particularly, women’s economic empowerment (importantly, this is the ability for womxn to increase their wealth, and also the power to make economic decisions for themselves and their communities).
The leadership structures of each of the three communities with whom we have co-designed solutions, have been demographically representative of their communities. In the case of these three communities, the majority of the active leaders have been womxn. Active facilitation and listening is utilised in these co-design sessions to ensure that everyone’s voice is heard (i.e. really bring womxn into the design process) and to ensure that the solutions we co-design will help to meet the needs of all residents within these communities. Energy plays an overwhelming role in womxn’s daily lives, from feeding their families, to teaching their children in the dark, to potentially powering their microenterprises. Because the co-design teams are so well represented, the challenges that are prioritized are often those that, if solved, will positively impact the lives of womxn and children in these communities, for e.g. Safety; connectivity and its related benefits.
In Freedom Farm and Malawi Camp, the service provider will also be running training programmes for solar installers, some of whom may be promoted to become contracted solar installers for the project. This opportunity is open to all eligible residents — including womxn.
How has the COVID 19 impacted your work? Are there any relations between the pandemic and your work? What are there any positives from this impact?
We had just started our tender process and concluded the site visit stage with our bidders for the provision of energy services in Freedom Farm and Malawi Camp when Level 5 Lockdown was announced. This was obviously an incredible challenge — for us — but also (and even more so) for the communities who now had to deal with all the challenges COVID19 brought into their already-vulnerable communities, and now a delay in a project which could have brought some relief to them ahead of the colder Winter months. While we managed to complete the tender process and evaluation quite uneventfully, there was no way we could begin work in the communities before the peak was over, considering
- their vulnerability to the disease and
- global shipment delays.
Once lower levels of lockdown were announced, we took precautions to meet with the leadership teams off-site in sanitized and secure locations to update them on the progress and to understand their comfort with services continuing. Despite the dire need for the services, they agreed that it was better to wait for the peak to end to protect their communities. We also heard their other challenges, and used our networks to try to help them register for the relevant grants and to raise awareness for COVID19 in their communities. The only benefit of the lockdown, as claimed by the community leaders, was the ban of alcohol, which significantly helped many families and the community to remain peaceful and work together to fight this pandemic. The project has since resumed, thankfully!
What advice would you give to individuals trying to raise awareness about disparity in energy access and use by gender?
Do not be discouraged. There is, no doubt, a long way to go, but people DO care and change IS happening. Educate your peers and colleagues, and work from within — in your own projects and in your own teams. Call out discrimination as you see it — don’t be a bystander. Ask questions. There are also many programmes trying to create change in this space, join them and participate.
What trends do you foresee for the future of gender empowerment and equality in the energy access space?
Tackling gender inequality tackles poverty — the gender-energy nexus is an opportunity to fast-track that change. There are already so many critical direct and indirect benefits of access to energy, and applying a gendered lens to these programmes can play a role in uplifting entire communities out of poverty.
Looking to the future, what projects would you like to develop further, and do you have any particular goals or milestones that you would like to reach?
I want to see South Africans empowered to achieve their potential by capitalizing on the promise of safe and reliable access to energy. The work we do has a direct impact on changing the narrative of energy-poor communities by empowering them to articulate their unique contexts and working with them to co-design (alternative energy) solutions that will address their needs, building their resilience at the same time. Whether these projects are delivered directly in communities through the ASDU or through our work in trying to convince municipalities to embrace innovative and alternative approaches to service delivery in unserviceable informal settlements, I think this is where my focus will be for the next while.
The Meet the Women in Energy Series features women in the energy sector who are committed to transforming the energy space. This series seeks to inspire other women and to showcase the many talented women working in the sector ranging from entrepreneurs, experts, senior executives, middle managers to young professionals’ and new graduates.
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