Introducing IEEE Empower a Billion Lives

Access to electricity is critical to health care delivery. Without electricity, many health care interventions simply cannot be provided. Only 26% of health facilities in the Sub-Saharan Africa has access to reliable electricity. Water is the most essential element of life; it is required for basic sustenance, health and irrigation. Nearly one billion people do not have access to clean, safe water. Education is one of the most essential components for poverty reduction. According to UNDESA, about 90% of children in Sub-Saharan Africa attend primary schools that lack electricity, while 27% of village schools in India lack electricity access. For more than a billion people worldwide, kerosene lamps are the primary lighting source, which is expensive, unsafe and carcinogenic. Electricity is a key component of economic empowerment and can increase household per capita income by 39 percent.

The IEEE Foundation supported IEEE Empower a Billion Lives (EBL) Competition is a global competition aimed at fostering innovation to develop solutions to electricity access. Solutions are expected to be scalable, regionally relevant, holistic and leverage 21st century technologies with exponentially declining prices. IEEE EBL addresses many of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The competition is open to all including student groups, small and medium-sized companies, research labs, international corporations and non-profits. There are more than 75 IEEE volunteers on Global and Regional Committees to facilitate the competition in Pacific Asia, South Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. Visit the EBL website to learn more. Online proposal submission is open through 31 August 2018.