Alfoura is an unrecognized Bedouin village located in southern Israel. While these villages lack basic services due to their legal status, the Israeli Ministry of Education guarantees the right to education, funding teachers and in some cases school buildings.
This is the case of the Alfoura school, which gets limited electricity thanks to an exception linked to a building permit granted in 1974. However, the villages rely on diesel generators, which are noisy and polluting.
This is why the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, in collaboration with the Jewish-Bedouin NGO Shamsuna and other organizations, presented a project to provide electricity to the school in a sustainable way and off the grid, as well as to ensure the water supply.
Harnessing the power of the sun, Alfoura School has implemented an off-grid technology hub pilot project, considered the first of its kind in the region.
The project, announced during the second annual Shamsuna conference in Rahat, could benefit more than 70% of the world's population affected by climate change.
The project involves five sustainable technological installations: a solar system for recycling wastewater using bacteria and algae, agrovoltaic solar panels that generate energy while promoting crop growth, batteries for storing energy, a biogas system that converts organic waste into methane gas and fertilizer, and machines that extract drinking water from the air.
The use of solar energy is also expanding in Bedouin villages through solar fields on land negotiated with the state. Currently, two solar fields are in operation, and three more have been approved.