The households with the least income cannot afford to rent our Solar Home Systems. Nevertheless, they would very much prefer electric light to the petrol lamps and candles they generally use. Lower-income households have persistently asked us for cheaper solutions for basic lighting. After some research, our solution is battery-charging stations for rechargeable lamps, which local operators rent from us. This allows us to expand the accessibility of solar lighting to the large number of lower-income households, while at the same time retaining all the proven advantages of a rental service for the villagers.

Such lamps are compact units that villagers can hang up inside a room or easily carry, including a rechargeable battery. Each lamp is set to burn 12 hours.

The Sunlabob solar lamps are rented out by households throughout the villages and recharged by a large state-of-the-art solar array, which is installed somewhere at a centrally accessible location. The households only pay a refundable deposit and a discharging-fee, so it is affordable to them.

Sunlabob buys and installs the solar-charging stations and rents them out to village technicians at cost-covering prices. Sunlabob trains these village technicians to correctly service and maintain both the charging station as well as the rechargeable lamps in order to ensure correct maintenance and longevity.

Furthermore, we train Village Energy Committees, which are public institutions operating under the supervision of village authorities. The Committees organize the energy requirements for the village as well as the reliable payment of rents.