Life in the Cucuasa community
On July 25 2021, our LUTW technical team arrived at the port of the native community of Cucuasa. This community is 8 hours from Santa María de Nieva, in the district of Río Santiago and like most communities in the district is only accessible by boat. Cucuasa is characterized by being a cheerful, warm and collaborative community. In Cucuasa the native language, “Wampis”, is widely spoken, and closely links the community to its ancestral culture. The main economic activities are trade, hunting, gathering, construction, and agriculture. During their daily routine you can see their commitment to communal work and other well-coordinated community activities accompanied by an inevitable masato (a typical drink of the Amazon made from yuca root) which serves as an energizer.
The impact of LUTW in numbers
Cucuasa pre-school
In Cucuasa three projects, one for each pre-school, primary school, and high school respectively, were approved. In the case of the pre-school it was built about 10 years ago and is in good structural condition to be able to host classes but, it has never been electrified. It currently has 27 children in attendance and the only way to partially energize the school is using a generator. For LUTW this is a very concerning situation where children from an early age are considering regular generator usage as a normal practice. After an evaluation, 550W of photovoltaic power, a battery bank of 480Ah, and an inverter of 1200W were designated for the pre-school, which can easily energize the electrical equipment they use such as: laptops, printers, cell phones, radios, a television, lights, projectors, TV/DVD player, and a blender.
Cucuasa primary school
In the case of the primary school, it currently hosts 65 students and it has an infrastructure made of cement and wood. Due to the nature of the climate, its roofs are made of corrugated iron, with a simple water drainage system due to the frequent rains in the area. The primary school had a wired electrical system, which was implemented many years ago but, over-time the weather conditions have deteriorated its condition to the point of rendering it useless. The children of the primary school of Cucuasa face many obstacles in the way of their studies and the lack of access to electricity is one of the main ones. In this school, they have not been able to use their tablets that the state has sent to them due to them not being able to charge them.
According to the previous evaluation the primary school was considered to have met the criteria to house a system of 1300W of photovoltaic power, consisting of a 4 module arrangement of 325W each established by an evaluation of the solar resource available in the area. A 960Ah battery bank offers the capacity to absorb and store the energy necessary to power the school for more than 2 days without having received any energy from the solar modules. Using the normal electricity consumption patterns established for the school a 2000W pure sine wave inverter was chosen. This provides high quality alternating current (the same or better quality than the electrical grid) with the capacity necessary to energize the equipment evaluated in the school without damaging them. This 1300W system became a standard model for primary schools and high schools, due to the fact that they share very similar energy consumption patterns in this area of the Peruvian Amazon.
Cucuasa hish school
Finally, the installation of the Cucuasa high school system, an institution that was founded four decades ago but had implemented improvements in 2012 to better its infrastructure, was initiated. The principles office and 3 classrooms were constructed with concrete but the 9th grade classrooms are made of wood. The high school was designated a system of 1300W of solar power, identical to the model proposed for primary schools. This school stretched over 100m and had over 7 classrooms between its point of power generation and the last point where it must reach. This situation generated a design challenge to guarantee the quality of energy to the furthest point of its installation. Days after the installation, an energy consumption and quality analysis confirmed the good operation of the system and demonstrated the benefits that the system brings to its students and teachers.
LUTW is aware of systems installed in remote communities that end up failing prematurely due to misuse whether it be intentional or not. Therefore, LUTW considers it extremely important to correctly train the users of the solar systems to promote system durability, and responsible energy consumption throughout the community. The community of Cucuasa now has three schools energized with an off-grid power generation system and is on the path towards improving their education quality.
Acknowledgment
LUTW thanks all the people and entities that directly and indirectly supported the development of these three projects in Cucuasa. LUTW appreciates the partnership with DirecTV for sharing our mission to light up the Peruvian Amazon and bring connectivity to these areas, Mr. Pancho Pujupat, leader of the Cucuasa community, Ms. Nathaly Vilchez, high school coordinator, and the community that was informed at all times of LUTW’s work in Cucuasa.
