The Mangalath colony is a small village with no street lighting along the 300-meter road that leads up to their houses making evening returns very dangerous. The village does not have the means to continuously pay an electricity bill which is why there needs to be a low-cost solution that provides them with proper street lighting.
This project is focused on assembling a low-cost street lighting system, to help out the small community and ensure they are safe driving at all times of the day. Their solution is a solar off-grid system with ten 15w LED lamps spread across the 300 meters, which is enough to provide enough light with no electricity bill. The whole system is to be supported by two solar panels, two 48-hour backup batteries, inverters, and a few other components. To make it even easier for the villagers, it is an automatic control system, so they never have to worry about maintenance.
The team is to first gather all of the necessary materials such as the poles, LED lamps, wires, and more before they start assembling the system, which is to happen two weeks after. The entire project is intended to take 8 weeks, from start to finish, and there will also be a documentary recording this process.
The team is very focused on making the community a better place, as they are also excited about introducing solar technology to the residents. This will mark a solar revolution in rural India.
EPICS in IEEE gave a grant of $4,250 to purchase needed materials and other necessities in order to assemble this solar off-grid system. The team will be working with Avoly Gramapanchayat who is part of the Kerala Government and always strives to better the community by helping the residents.