Our Current Projects
4 different projects, 4 different teams
Energy for Refugees is currently active in 4 different cities in the Netherlands, namely Delft, Leiden, Amsterdam and Utrecht. Each team is working on a different project for a whole year, doing everything that is needed to bring that project to completion. From engineering and system designing, to organizing events and gathering the funds for the project, each team has full independence in their choices and their process. The 2026 projects are announced below!
Delft Team 2026
In the heart of the La Guajira desert, the EfR Delft team is partnering with local NGO BePelican to bring renewable energy to the indigenous Wayuu people. As one of South America’s most arid regions, La Guajira faces a critical shortage of water and electricity. By installing sustainable infrastructure, we are specifically supporting the people of the Weaving Program. Reliable lighting extends their working hours safely past sunset, providing these artisans with the tools to build long-term financial stability for their families. Alongside BePelican and the local food bank, we work in direct consultation with community leaders to ensure our technical expertise meets their lived reality.
Leiden Team 2026
This year, Energy for Refugees – Leiden/The Hague is implementing Beyond Blackouts in partnership with MOSCTHA, a Dominican organization that has supported Haitian refugees, migrants, and stateless populations for over four decades. At the heart of this collaboration is a community clinic in Santo Domingo Norte, operated by MOSCTHA, which provides essential healthcare to populations often excluded from formal systems.
In the Dominican Republic, Haitians represent the largest marginalized group, frequently facing structural barriers to healthcare, legal recognition, and formal employment. As a result, many depend on community-based providers like MOSCTHA for access to basic services. Yet even these critical lifelines are constrained by chronic energy insecurity: frequent outages, reaching up to 64 hours per month, disrupt maternal care, HIV treatment, diagnostics, and emergency procedures, directly compromising patient safety and continuity of care.
Beyond Blackouts responds to this layered vulnerability by equipping the clinic with a solar photovoltaic system and battery storage, delivering a reliable, sustainable energy supply for critical operations. By ensuring uninterrupted power, the project will enable safe, continuous healthcare for over 40,000 patients annually, while reducing dependence on diesel generators and associated CO₂ emissions.
Designed as a scalable, context-specific intervention, the initiative goes beyond immediate relief. It strengthens long-term resilience, enhances institutional autonomy, and advances equitable, dependable access to healthcare in displacement-affected settings.
Amsterdam Team 2026
In northern Kenya, the EfR Amsterdam team is partnering with Restore Hope for Street Children, a small, refugee-led, grassroots initiative based in Kakuma Refugee Camp. It was founded by Patrick Nyongolo, a Congolese refugee. When Patrick arrived in Kakuma, the largest refugee camp in the world, he saw young children sleeping on the streets alone, hungry, and without anyone to care for them and stepped in to help. Today, through Restore Hope for Street Children, Patrick and his team provide more than 40 children with care, food, shelter, education and emotional support. The initiative also focuses on empowering children through technology, despite extremely limited resources, such as only one laptop shared among many children and no electricity. This is where we want to step in and give them access to clean energy.
Utrecht Team 2026
In that same region, another local initiative is in the making.
Team Utrecht is partnering up with NARA climate, local contractors and several local Refugee Led Organisations (RLOs) in Kalobeyei refugee settlement, Kenya. Kalobeyei is a settlement adjacent to Kakuma refugee camp, but whether it is called a “settlement” or a “camp” makes little difference for the living conditions there. The region is desertified, harsh and barren. It takes a lot of effort and creativity to survive, let alone thrive. Luckily, local RLOs are creative and resourceful. Some refugees in Kalobeyei designed a successful mushroom farming concept, which falls under the RLO ‘Farming and Health Education’ (FHE). Others found a way to process organic waste into biochar fuel briquettes. They are the RLO ‘Rafiki wa Mazingira’ or ‘Friends of nature’. The RLO Kakbees keeps bees and produces wax and honey products. All of these initiatives create work opportunities for the community, produce food, increase financial independence and make the region of Kakuma and Kalobeyei more liveable. The only thing missing to make all of these initiatives thrive, is reliable power. Power from the sun to operate a sizeable borehole and an industrial hub where all RLO initiatives can come together. With water, space and working machines, the people in Kalobeyei can expand on their ideas.