Light as obviously known dispels darkness and brings joy. This was manifested in Our Lady’s Nursery and Primary School Bomadi, Delta State, Nigeria at the dawn of the year 2024. The school resumed on January 9th 2024 and the amazement of the parents, staff and pupils at the sight of the new solar system was awesome. Nigeria has struggled with epileptic power supply for decades, a challenge that cost huge amount of money annually for businesses. This is a big problem particularly for those in the rural areas like Our Lady’s School Bomadi.
Solar system is a sustainable alternative to fossil fuel; it offers environmental benefits such as reduced gas emission, improved air quality and conservation of natural resources. It saves money and it is environmentally friendly with numerous benefits. Over a decade now, there has not been any power supply in Bomadi town, where our school is located. The school depended on generating system since 2020 that the old batteries stopped functioning. The generating system capacity was erratic and unreliable and could not meet the increasing load demand coupled with the economic downturn which has doubled the price of fuel and diesel. Thus, it has been very difficult to manage the school.
In October 2023 the Religious Sisters of Charity in collaboration with the Misean Cara, a donor agency, funded the upgrade of the solar system to forty batteries, twenty-four solar panels, ten KVA inverter system for the administrative block, 3.5 KVA each for the nursery and primary blocks and many other gargets for the solar system. The major expenses of the school on daily basis have been on fuel because generator were used for about seven hours every school day for office use and computer classes.
Apart from the challenges already enumerated, there was also a problem of heatwave causing the temperature of the body to be high, as well as heat exhaustion which affects the pupils’ ability to learn.
Joyfully to say that since January 2024, the pupils now learn in a conducive teaching and learning environment with fans in their classrooms to cool off the hot weather. Currently, generator are only used to pump water, every other electrical power used in the school is fully dependent on solar system. The milestone on energy supply was acknowledged by the Chief Inspector of Education (CIE) and her team, during their supervisory visit in our school. The CIE recognized that the school is outstanding in academic excellence as she saw the fully powered computer lab and the children learning under uninterrupted power supply.
All thanks to the Religious Sisters of Charity and Misean Cara as they journeyed with us to bring about this wonderful eco-friendly renewable energy to our reach. The wish of our foundress Venerable Mary Aikenhead is that her daughters would give to the poor what the rich can afford with money and the saying is incarnated in the service we render in Our Lady’s School Bomadi.
Sr. Chioma Ezeh, RSC
March 12, 2024
