3 minute read
Solar Sisters and friends
PLANET Renewables
Andrea Gaffney is using pictures and words to help ‘little earthlings’ learn and teachers teach renewable energy. Here she tells us what it’s all about in her own words and playful images.
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PLANET RENEWABLES is a young start-up established with the aim of helping children learn and teachers teach renewable energy; to build the knowledge capital and foster the right mindset in children to accelerate the transition to a renewable energy future.
I believe it is never too early to educate children on the low carbon technological solutions readily available for deployment. It should start as soon as they commence school for today’s children will be tomorrow’s adults. Adults who will inherit a planet, an environment and an energy system that is radically different to the one you and I were born with.
And the signs suggest increasingly children are not just wanting but demanding that we, the adults, act with urgency and determination. Think of the children that went on strike for climate action last year and 16 year old Greta Thunberg at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
I hope that through storytelling, in words and pictures, Planet Renewables will help spark the imagination and inspiration in children to ensure they think differently about our energy options for the future.
The Electric Solar Sisters is the first in a series of books that aims to explain some facts about renewable energy. Each of the characters has a challenge but when the characters come together, co-operate and behave as a team, the individual weaknesses can be overcome by calling upon the other characters’ strengths.
If we are to transition to a world of 100 per cent renewable energy then increasingly this is one of the key nuances to be communicated. Hybridisation of our grid and off-grid markets can deliver energy stability and help overcome the variability of the individual renewable energy inflows.
Spreading the word
With pre-sale orders secured from renewable energy companies Green Energy Trading, Solar Juice and Natural Technologies, I gained the confidence to release my first book The Electric Solar Sisters late last year.
Since then, I have sold numerous copies to many people I know in the industry. I have ‘door stopped’ people from Alan Finkel to Malcolm Turnbull, and to local bookstores to introduce my idea. I am currently in conversations with many schools on how best to incorporate Planet Renewable’s resources into the classroom.
It is early days but the responses I have received so far have been encouraging and gratifying. One five-year-old girl loves the book so much she reads it over and over and took it to school for show and tell. Wow! I was not expecting that when I set out to write it!
“Luckily, Bert, the friendly, reliable battery was sitting just outside Ella’s window.
He yelled out: “Don’t worry Ella, everything will be more than satisfactory because
I am Bert the Battery. I’m switched on, set to go and ready to let the energy flow.”
But I have a feeling there might be some big earthlings that could learn a thing or two from reading the book! And there is much more in the development pipeline, so stay tuned for the next Planet Renewables energy calling.
Andrea Gaffney is driven by a passion for the need to transform the energy system to zero carbon. She is a senior executive with more than 25 years’ experience in the renewable energy and energy industry working across the private and public sector. Former employers include ARENA, BP Solar, Clean Energy Council and the Committee for Melbourne. Email: hello@planetrenewables.com Phone: 0406 547 764
