Keeling Curve

Primary Project Category:

Secondary Project Category:

Year Project Originated:

Project Summary / Description:

WATTS ON: Lighting Students’ Lives is a climate and education initiative that replaces fossil-fuel lighting with solar lamps for students living off-grid, while rigorously monitoring educational outcomes and household-level qualitative impacts.
In many rural and underserved communities, the lack of electricity means students rely on kerosene lamps or firewood to study after dark—if they can study at all. These fuels are dangerous, expensive, and carbon-intensive, and they create a direct barrier to education once the sun sets.
Through school-based distribution in partnership with ChildFund International, WATTS ON delivers solar lamps directly to students through a training and sensitization day with parents and teachers, aligned with County Education and local stakeholders and integrates education monitoring through teachers and the education department. Educational performance is tracked using teacher-supported quantitative indicators primarily National level exam scores. Homework completion, attendance, and classroom engagement is also reviewed alongside structured qualitative feedback from teachers and students and families.
Beyond the classroom, the program captures qualitative household impacts through follow-up surveys and community feedback, including:
-Increased study hours in the home
-Improved student confidence and wellbeing
-Safer household environments with reduced fire risk
-Enhanced communication and evening productivity for families
- Teachers—many of whom also live without reliable electricity—provide additional insights into how access to light affects lesson preparation, grading, and community engagement.

Each solar lamp eliminates the need for kerosene lighting, avoiding approx. 92 kg of CO₂ per year, while delivering measurable educational benefits and meaningful improvements in daily life. With a lamp lifespan of approximately 5 years, the program provides long-term climate impact alongside sustained educational and social gains.

WATTS ON demonstrates that climate solutions can be both measurable and deeply human—using light as a catalyst for improved learning, safety, and resilience at the household and community level.

Country or Countries of Operation:

Regions of Operations:

How Project Affects Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions:

Our project reduces the use of kerosene and wood, cut from nearby forests which is burned in the homestead for cooking and light.

Best Estimate of GHG Avoidance/Reduction of This Project (Tonnes CO2 Equivalent/Year):

Sustainable Development Goals:

Impact on Underrepresented Groups:

We work with students from Semi-nomadic and pastoralist communities that live without access to lighting at home and we select those that have none to limited access at school also.  The most vulnerable.  We work with people of color, women, and those living in arid regions and vulnerable communities. This is part of the selection process when choosing the schools to work with.

Sub-Categories:

Mission Statement:

The econic earth foundation was founded to advance the protection and preservation of the earth’s natural environment with renewable energy solutions and maintain a healthy and balanced eco-system for many generations to come.

The WATTS On Lighting Students Lives Program works to empower students living off-grid with light.

Greatest Current Funding Need:

Sources of Past Funding: