In a conversation with NITV Radio, Chantelle Johns a community project organiser who was instrumental in supporting Marlinja residents in the design and development of the project says that Marlinja's solar powered microgrid results from a close collaboration between the community and non-profit project developer Original Power.
She also elaborated on the many structural, policy and technical barriers they had to overcome to bring this project to fruition.
Social housing regulation are far behind in terms of adopting new technologiesChantelle Johns
“The project we are launching is actually our plan B. In plan A, we wanted rooftop solar on all the houses, but due to social housing in Marlinja there weren’t any policies or regulations in place to support that, so we had to adopt the microgrid concept which is ten times more expensive,” Chantelle Johns said.
This, in Chantelle Johns' view highlights that social housing rules and regulationare far behind in terms of adopting new technologies.
Marlinja residents say that the micro grid which was five years in the making will provide them with cheaper and cleaner power, and put an end to regular blackouts
