Chief Executive Officer of The Substance Abuse Foundation (SAF) Inc., Marietta Carrington showing the signed document. Looking on are (from right) SAF Chairman, Peter Boos; National Coordinator of the GEF SGP at the UNDP, David Bynoe; and Board Member – Resource Acquisition with SAF, Barbara Trieloff-Deane.
GOING SOLAR
In its effort to be more sustainable, Verdun House has been generating its own electricity and selling the excess to the Barbados Light and Power Company Limited.
The all-male, residential treatment facility located in St. John has been doing so for the past three months. The move is part of the ‘Solar Rooftop Project’, which is funded by the Global Environment Facility Small Grants Programme (GEF SGP), implemented by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Through the Project, the rooftops of all the buildings are outfitted with solar panels. These panels are also on the compound’s animal and vegetable farms.
On Tuesday, Chief Executive Officer of The Substance Abuse Foundation (SAF) Inc., Marietta Carrington, signed an agreement launching the initiative. She explained that 502 panels are on the buildings. These will generate a yearly “income stream of approximately a hundred thousand [dollars] to support” the SAF in its educational and rehabilitation efforts.
Meanwhile, SAF Chairman Peter Boos said the Project would help the health institution to move away from mainly “relying on philanthropy and charity to relying on a commercial income.
“So the reliance on private funding like that has risks and things change. So the opportunity to [have] sustainability and long-term sustainability, if you like, is what keeps Marietta up at nights and certainly keeps me up at night – how do we transform from relying on very generous private philanthropists to having a revenue source that is sustainable and reliable over many years? So that at the end of the day we do this to help the people who need this help, the people in recovery, that is what we do, that is why we do it. There is no other reason why we do it, that is the only reason we do it, is to help the people who need the help.”
National Coordinator of the GEF SGP at the UNDP, David Bynoe lauded SAF for “transitioning this Project from just being an idea to something that is tangible or reality”. He further stated the Project was one that could be replicated locally and regionally.
He also outlined some of the core benefits of it. These included providing SAF with an opportunity for income generation.
It also provided a chance for individuals, “five female clients and 15 male clients”, to be trained within the Project and the renewable energy generated is being used to help rehabilitate clients.