Putting in the hard yards to deliver simple, clean energy technology to remote communities has earned a US$1.5 million prize for Indonesia-based not-for-profit organization Kopernik.

Kopernik’s stunning success in winning the Zayed Future Energy Prize, established by United Arab Emirates’ late founder and former president Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, has the potential to change lives for the better across Indonesia and the 24 other nations that Kopernik works with.

Ewa Wojkowska, Kopernik’s co-founder and chief operating officer, who was in Abu Dhabi to receive the prize, said the win was an outstanding achievement for the NFP that to date has reached more than 180,000 people in remote villages across Indonesia and almost a further 200,000 elsewhere.

“There is no prize like this in the world. So, it’s a game changer for us,” said Wojkowska from Kopernik’s Ubud base last Monday.

With current and former heads of state and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon among an audience of more than 33,000, Wojkowska likened the Zayed Future Energy Prize event to a film award ceremony.

“This is like the Oscars of renewable energy. The prize is granted during the Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week. This is the eighth Zayed prize. The late Sheikh Zayed was a visionary leader who did an enormous amount around environmental stewardship, meaning he supported and developed of a lot of initiatives focusing on sustainable development such as afforestation,” said Wojkowska on the award ceremony and the man who once headed the oil and gas-producing nation on the Arabian peninsula.

Working alongside some of Indonesia’s poorest communities, delivering simple household equipment such as solar lighting systems, efficient cook stoves, water filters and agricultural systems that allow farmers to add value to their crops, Wojkowska and her field teams know the value of a dollar. Receiving 1.5 million of them is an onerous responsibility.

“We feel this is a massive responsibility for us. We are speaking to our board [network of] partners on how we can invest this prize in the most impactful and responsible way. But at the end of the day, we want to reach the greatest number of people and have the biggest possible impact and this prize allows for that,” said Wojkowska, who formerly worked in Indonesia with the United Nations — which was when she fell in love with the archipelago.

“I worked here in Indonesia for the UN, so I had a deep connection with the country and saw a need, so we decided to focus our operations here,” said this extraordinary woman, who with her team and co-founders has shone a light into homes and villages at the furthest reaches of the nation.

Simple solutions: Smoke-free stoves and water purifiers offer simple solutions for people off the grid in Indonesia.(JP/JB Djwan)

The work of Kopernik in bringing sustainable, affordable and just as importantly, durable technologies to off-the-grid villages has been taken up by local governments. In the arid village of Balurebong, eastern Flores, every home has solar lighting.

“In Balurebong, the village head used the central government’s village funds to purchase 80 home solar systems, in effect giving access to lighting to every household in that village. I see that as a great achievement of local governments and NFP’s working together for the benefit of the people,” said Wojkowska.

Kopernik’s main focus has been delivering sustainable household technologies, but the NGO is now turning its focus to the agricultural sphere.

Recent technology fairs in Flores introduced farmers to a range of tools, such as solar-powered rice hullers, a foot-powered rice thresher, a corn ear sheller, cashew opener and grain storage sacks.

Under traditional methods of storing rice up to 50 percent of harvests can be lost to weevils and vermin. Simple heavy black plastic harvest storage sacks can prevent infestation; in times of poor field returns this could mean the difference between starvation and survival for villages at the end of their tether.

Cashew openers offer farmers of this dry land crop the opportunity to value add, explains Wojkowska. Unshelled cashews earn just one fifth what the shelled version does.

“Cashews are a very difficult nut to open, a complex nut that takes around 20 seconds per nut for an experienced sheller,” says Wojkowska. Opening cashews is similar to shucking oysters, so the shelling machine offers massive potential for economic benefits to farmers, because they can reap the far greater income of selling shelled cashews, rather than unshelled.

“These technologies are aimed at improving returns for farmers with sustainable technologies. They offer a massive boost in potential for people in the poorest regions of Indonesia,” says Wojkowska.

Kopernik’s win in January of the world’s richest sustainable energy prize, the US$1.5 million Zayed Future Energy Prize for Non-Profit Organizations, guarantees that those living on the fringes of development will, one day, compete with those living in the center.

Winning smile: <)