Sabana Grande

Our time at Sabana Grande was filled with getting to know our families, the community, and learnng lots of interesting information on using renewable energy. As soon as we arrived at the center, we were greeted by the ¨solar women¨ who are responsible for building the solar ovens at the center. As part of their involvement in the center they host a variety of voluenteers from all over the world who come and donate their skills and time for a 3 month stay in the community. After a round of ice breaker activites, we were off to our new homes to meet our families. With all of our belongings on our backs, we walked through the community, passed the 500 year old Ceba tree, and moved into our new homes.
For the next two weeks we met at the center and learned what we could about it´s history, its mission, and how to harness the sun´s energy. Typically, volunteers pick a project to work on that will help advance the center´s ability too bring renewable energy to the surrounding communites. We were able to see two of these projects in action during our short stay. One voluenteer from London was building a solar tester that would provide more information on the power of the sun´s rays, helping to eliminate the current practice of one individual looking at the sun to determin its strength. Two other voluenteers (one from Germany, and the other from Alaska) were in the process of building a wind turbine that would trickle charge a battery that could be used for power at the center, and providing an example of other renewable resources avaiable for the communites.
As we learned more about how solar energy can be converted to usable energy, we had the opportunity to build our own solar battery chargers for us to take back to the U.S. with us. Carefully over the next two days, we soddered the solar cells together, tested the charging capacity, build a housing frame and put it all together with lots of silicon. Our charging station for the batteries consisted of a wooden base with two fixed metal plates which we were able to adjust depending on the size of battery we wanted to charge. Before we knew it, we had the finished product in hand, ready to use! Not only do we have wonderful memories to take back home with us, but also a very practical outlet for our new understanding of renewable energy.
-Meg