The Azraq refugee camp in Jordan established in 2014 for Syrian refugees confronted common energy outages and unreliable entry to electrical energy – a state of affairs that afflicts most refugee camps world wide. 

Luckily for the residents of Azraq, Heba Asa’d noticed a possibility of their dilemma.

Asa’d is CEO and Co-Founding father of NeuroTech, a startup that developed a wise power administration system to optimize the usage of power in underserved areas that lack entry to dependable electrical energy, corresponding to refugee camps.  

The 31-year-old Jordan native says her firm is assembly a necessity that might in any other case go unfulfilled, as folks dwelling in refugee camps are a number of the most affected by lack of entry to electrical energy. 

In 2017, Azraq grew to become the world’s first refugee camp to be powered by photo voltaic power. Whereas the clear power system was extraordinarily useful to the residents, who had lived with out electrical energy till then, it was designed with little consideration for his or her precise power demand wants. The electrical energy is prone to produce shortages, making it exhausting to fulfill the residents’ steady power wants, particularly essential life-saving medical power wants. 

“The electrical energy system in Azraq was failing. It was not offering lighting at night time to permit youngsters to check, and it was not powering the nebulizers and different medical units critically wanted through the COVID-19 pandemic to assist youngsters and adults breathe,” Asa’d stated. 

Households in Azraq are entitled to roughly 16 hours of electrical energy per day, however many had been receiving considerably much less — nearer to 9 hours a day, in accordance with Asa’d. The camp’s electrical energy mannequin doesn’t encourage environment friendly utilization from the customers’ facet and doesn’t permit every family to handle their important wants individually, corresponding to the power to prioritize lighting, medical units or refrigeration. 

To deal with this downside, NeuroTech developed an progressive power optimizer that makes use of synthetic intelligence (AI)-based algorithms that preserve a good distribution of power. Their power administration system funnels power to high-priority areas the place it’s wanted most, just like the camp’s hospital and resident’s private nebulizers.

Their sensible system redistributes power within the following approach: the primary power feeder is devoted to excessive precedence hundreds, corresponding to medical units, lighting and refrigeration, whereas the second is devoted to low precedence hundreds, corresponding to air-con, followers and electrical heaters. The power feeder limits are outlined primarily based on a wise algorithm.

Picture courtesy Zayed Sustainability Prize

“For the primary time, by separating hundreds, beneficiaries are assured to obtain their life-saving power, and the additional power is then despatched to low precedence hundreds in accordance with power availability,” Asa’d stated.

Of their pilot section, NeuroTech prolonged 24-hour electrical energy entry to 1,000 Azraq residents. Since then, they’ve secured 24-hour electrical energy entry for over 10,000 of the camp’s residents.

Off-the-shelf options lack the identical degree of precision and management, as they’re usually generic monitoring instruments with out built-in controlling capabilities. Moreover, refugee camps pose vital logistical challenges that make it tough to put in present plug-and-play choices. 

“Our resolution is designed with humanitarian features in thoughts. And never solely that, but in addition beneficiaries are concerned within the design course of for the primary time ever, which is one thing nonetheless unavailable in our markets,” Asa’d stated.

NeuroTech was in a position to develop a working resolution thanks largely to a dedication to working instantly with the residents on the bottom, and because of their sensible system’s capability to gather detailed knowledge. Usually the dearth of dependable knowledge on power utilization and consumption in refugee camps makes it tough to estimate the true general power demand for camp services and households.

“One in every of our targets is to gather detailed knowledge on the character of electrical energy consumption within the focused areas, which is helpful in offering the required knowledge for analysis and to interpret the conduct and enhance it utilizing incentive-based program,” Asa’d shared.

NeuroTech’s system is particularly handy for non-governmental organizations and funding companies that help the camp. That’s as a result of NeuroTech’s sensible power administration system helps scale back the camp’s general power consumption by storing extra electrical energy that was beforehand wasted and feeding it the place it’s wanted most at peak demand occasions.

Now, after successful the 2023 Zayed Sustainability Prize within the Vitality class, NeuroTech is utilizing the US $600,000 fund to additional develop and enhance their know-how, broaden their operations and attain

extra folks in want.

As a Zayed Sustainability Prize winner, NeuroTech is gaining larger recognition and publicity within the trade, which in flip helps them appeal to new prospects, traders and companions. Successful the Prize can also be offering them with the chance to community with different progressive corporations and organizations, and doubtlessly collaborate on new tasks and initiatives, underscoring the significance of entities just like the  Prize in serving to to catalyze the worldwide sustainability motion by inspiring collective motion on a worldwide scale. 

The Zayed Sustainability Prize is the United Arab Emirates’ pioneering world award in sustainability. As we speak, the prize counts 15 years of worldwide affect with over 378 million folks world wide benefitting from its 106 winners’ options.

The Zayed Sustainability Prize goals to drive sustainable growth and humanitarian motion by recognising and rewarding organizations and excessive faculties with sustainable options in well being, meals, power, water, and now with its new, particular class: Local weather Motion.

The Local weather Motion class is a recognition of the pressing want to deal with the worldwide local weather disaster. It seeks to award small and medium sized enterprises and nonprofit organizations which might be main the way in which in deploying environmental options and options that construct local weather adaptation and resilience.  

Like the opposite organizational classes – Well being, Meals, Vitality and Water – the Prize will award the winner of the Local weather Motion class US $600,000. Excessive faculties from world wide can submit their student-led venture proposals within the World Excessive Colleges class for a possibility to win as much as US $100,000. 

Submissions throughout all classes and nominations of worthy SMEs and NPOs to the Local weather Motion class are at present being accepted till 23 Could 2023.

This text is supported by the Zayed Sustainability Prize.