http://www.nvre.org/solar-panels.html
It is ironic that solar energy can result in significantly lower energy bills, something many economically challenged families struggle with, yet the average cost to implement alternative energy is out of reach of many who would benefit the most. 
New Vision provides a way for people to contribute to their own lives, to their neighbor’s lives, and to the community in which they live. Using our win-win approach, people will be able to discover the power of becoming an energy producer at the same time they are reducing their power bill.
We believe that with a small amount of training and support, people can be trained to build their own solar panels, while working with friends and neighbors to install solar systems both on their homes and the community facilities they depend on.
New Vision believes that hope is restored by believing in people, giving them the tools to help themselves and by creating a reason to come together and build community. This concept, without a doubt, is a time-tested, well-proven, age-old new vision.
New Vision’s Approach to Solar Energy Solutions
“That’s a really bad idea” replied the director of the National Renewable Energy Lab when he heard about the concept of making “hand crafted” solar panels. He didn’t get it; few people do. New Vision is not just about making cheaper solar panels, creating jobs, and saving money. It is about all those things and more.
David the Psalmist wrote that without a vision, we perish. Many in our country have lost a vision for their lives…many have lost hope. In other words, people live with the expectation that nothing good will happen. Hopelessness is pervasive in communities where poverty exists. Without hope isolation sets in as people become discouraged and pull away from one another. Hopelessness leaves people no longer believing in their God-given ability to make a difference—even in their own lives.
Years ago people and communities thrived on solving their own problems. There was no government agency, no “experts,” to tell people their ingenuity was a really bad idea. People worked alongside each other productively; building homes, barns, churches, communities and lives. Having a barn to build or a quilt to sew provided a focal point for people to come together for mutual benefit and encouragement. Vision birthed vision; hope birthed hope.
Find out how you can participate and begin taking advantage of the power of the sun and the power of the Son! Contact us at info@nvre.org or call 304-457-2971.
In the 740 rural counties in the U.S. more than 20% of our citizens live below the poverty line with little hope of reversing the cycles of generational poverty. It has been years since they were able to provide for themselves. Many live as beneficiaries of income that they do not earn; it is given with no expectation of any service in return.
Mother Teresa once said that the greatest tragedy of poverty is not having a lack resources but of having nothing to contribute. Where a vision exists of people providing for themselves, of all people having something to contribute, there is the place where human dignity thrives and hope is restored.
The “Genesis kits” have an interesting history. Ruston Seaman, a devout Christian who belongs to a non-denominational church, had met up with John Prusa, a Czech exile with a degree in electrical engineering. In 2009, they formed New Vision Renewable Energy. “We started making solar panels in our own community for families who needed help paying for utilities,” Seaman told me. They discovered that those old, heavy glass tub doors could be modified to make a solar panel. Who knew?
In March 2012, Seaman traveled to Kenya. “We had a woman, Cindy Kelley, who felt called to be a missionary,” he recalls. “It was the first time in the history of our church that we had sent forth a missionary. I traveled with her to help get her established.” They brought along a solar cooker. This provoked a conversation with one of the men in the village where Kelley would be working and living. “We could make these if we had shiny paper,” the man said to Seaman. Four months later at a solar trade show, Seaman saw a display with shiny paper at a 3-M display. He researched who at 3-m he needed to talk to, called and asked, “Have you ever thought about how your shiny paper could help the poorest people in the world?” A short time later, 3-M delivered reams of shiny paper to Chestnut Ridge. “It was a game changer.”
The group tried to figure out ways to make a kit that would permit a family in Kenya to collect solar power during the day sufficient to light their home in the evening for five hours. They needed something with structural support. “We happened to be at the end of the election cycle,” Seaman tells me. “All these political yards signs, for Romney, for Obama, for local candidates, were out on people’s lawns. They worked perfectly – they are lightweight and they were not destroyed by rain.” Shortly after, they started making the kits.
This past summer, the Monday night group made 300 Genesis kits and sent them to Kenya. Another 700 were made for Haiti in partnership with an organization in Texas. Seaman cites studies that indicate electricity in a home leads to higher educational advancement as well as less stress on a family. The New York Times ran a photo of children in Africa, squatting underneath street lights to do their homework. Seaman shared the photo with the kids. “This helps our kids, who are at the bottom of the food chain in our country, realize how much we have and how they can help those with less.”
Christian Albacan is 13 years old. He worked at the groups “Innovation Station” making the kits for two weeks this summer and now is a regular at the Monday night sessions. “I’m happy to know we are helping kids in need, who don’t have all the electricity we have here in the big U.S.,” he told me. Thomas Villors, 16, stumbled on the project. “First it started as a thing where we’d go to the park and play with some kids who did this, then we went to their church, ate with them, and they gave us a briefing about what to do, how to make the kits. We go every week. It’s really fun,” says Villors. He also notes that in addition to helping people with less, “I now have a new skill I can use to help other people. I wouldn’t have that if I had not joined up.”
It occurred to the group that they wanted to gain more notoriety for their work, to spread the message that something so small as five hours of electricity can make a huge change in other people’s lives. They decided to send one of the kits to someone famous who could be an ambassador for their work. President Obama was nominated, as was Shaquille O’Neal. But, the kids voted to select Pope Francis. Yesterday, Seaman sent one of the kits to the Apostolic Nuncio in Washington with the request that he send it on to the pope. “He [the pope] right now, he’s one of the most popular people in the world and maybe if he sees what we are doing, he can get word out about our technology to the rest of the world,” says Albacan.
“Our theology doesn’t require a lot of conversation,” says Seaman. “The theology of light is pretty obvious.” His comments are strewn with references to God’s goodness, mixed in with technological words he needs to explain to me. But, it is the accessibility of his project, and the beauty of the story – a group of disadvantaged children helping yet more disadvantaged children – that makes this project just the kind of thing that might catch Pope Francis’ attention. Who knows? A light bulb may go off in his head and his heart. One went off in mine: If Pope Francis can capture the imagination of children, most of them not even Catholic, in West Virginia, the potential for the Body of Christ to make a real difference in the lives of the most poor people on the planet will be the best kind of evangelization in the 21stcentury.
PORTABLE SOLAR POWER PACK & LIGHT
With almost 1.3 billion people living without the benefits of electricity, many of our world’s most vulnerable families and communities can be identified by the absence of modern energy alternatives. In the 21st century there remains a sad reality that people have to use fire or kerosene or candles to navigate in the night. Imagine all the changes that would take place in your life if there were no electricity. 40% of the childhood deaths in Kenya are related to respiratory disease and major contributors to this problem is the absence of clean energy options for cooking food and lighting homes. 
Imagine the challenges faced by children in the developing world who know that getting ahead means being at school during the day and studying at night, so you light a kerosene wick to have a flame to study by all the while you are huffing the fumes connected to your light source.
A 21st century solution is a simple combination of a small 10 watt solar panel, a compact 2V/9Ah lithium polymer battery and a set of super bright LED lights that provide the light for a family to enjoy some of the quiet hours at night. New Vision has developed a portable solar power pack and light that will allow families to harness electricity every hour of a sunny day to be used at night. Amazing what a change it can make into the educational development and personal safety of families simply to have a renewable light that can charge cell phone or run other small devices as well as provide a portable light that can be used every night.
New Vision is seeking to partner with sponsoring organizations and churches who are interested in helping families and communities have lights that extend the useful hours of daily life. New Vision has a growing number of international community partners who desire to expand a light project in their community or village.New Vision provides the training and technical support required to work in collaboration with a variety of groups and organizations to extend the use of renewable lighting around the world.
We also offer solar-powered water filtration products that complement our Portable Solar Light & Power Pack. Water filtration units remove 99.9% of bacteria to provide clean drinking water. Download the documents to the right to learn how Light & Life, Light & Water, and Light & Power can help children, families and villages in need.
In addition to purchasing solar lights directly, we also offer an option called Party In The Dark where you can host/attend a party designed to raise money for solar lights for people in developing countries around the world. For more information, click here.
PORTABLE SOLAR POWER PACK & LIGHT
New model available soon and website will be updated shortly.
Please call the office for ordering and details.
This simple light system is a very bright idea. It is both affordable and extremely portable providing 3-4 hours of bright LED lighting and the ability to store energy and charge electronic devices via USB ports and power outlets.
Ray of Life Room Solar Solution
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Light & Power
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Light & Water
Download Flyer (PDF)
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