UTE joins the OEI and the Elecnor Foundation to bring solar power to 90 schools in Uruguay

The Uruguayan company Administración Nacional de Usinas y Trasmisiones Eléctricas (UTE) has joined the Luces para Aprender Uruguay project and has become a partner, joining with the Ministry of Education and Culture (MEC), ANEP, Plan Ceibal, the Organization of Ibero-American States (OEI) and theElecnor Foundation.

In the presentation for the UTE's involvement in the project, which took place in Montevideo on Monday, the UTE's President Eng. Gonzalo Casaravilla and General Manager Acct. Carlos Pombo; Ignacio Hernaiz, Mercosur-Uruguay OEI director; and Germán Junquera, general director of Development forElecnor were present. According to the agreement's stipulations, UTE will contribute USD 300,000 to the initiative, whose goal is to provide photovoltaic-sourced solar power and Internet access to around 90 rural public schools in the country.

Luces para Aprender Uruguay is tasked with improving quality of life and educational conditions for thousands of children in Uruguay through the installation of an environmentally friendly and sustainable photovoltaic renewable energy system. This system covers schools' internal and external lighting needs and provides electricity to educational centres for the use of communication and technological equipment such as televisions, computers, and mobile telephones, among other equipment.

For the project's development and launch, the Elecnor Foundation is responsible for transport, installation, and launch of the photovoltaic system in schools, as well as preventative and corrective maintenance during the warranty period. As an additional task, the Foundation is training and preparing designated people in each of the beneficiary communities so that they have extensive knowledge about photovoltaic system use and maint

For their part, supplying and managing the equipment and systems needed for these schools to access the Internet will be supported by Uruguay's Ministry of Education and Culture through its CEIBAL Plan (an acronym in Spanish for Educational Connectivity for Basic Computing for Online Learning).

Bringing light and Internet to 66,000 Ibero-American schools

The Luces para Aprender Uruguay initiative was approved at the 22nd Ibero-American Education Ministers Conference held in Paraguay in September 2011 and originates from the “2021 Educational Goals” approved by the Heads of State and Government at the 20th Ibero-American Summit in December 2012.

The OEI-coordinated project seeks to address unresolved challenges, such as access to quality public education, combating poverty and inequality and contributing to the development and wellness of communities where the project operates. Information and Communication technologies (ICT) for teaching will be introduced for such purposes and an attempt will be made to end isolation of rural communications historically left behind in education through the installation of solar panels that ensure electrical energy supply as well as computers, with their corresponding Internet connections, to over 66,000 schools in the Ibero-American region.

In addition to Uruguay, the Ibero-American countries participating in the Luces para Aprender project are Colombia, Paraguay, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Peru, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Ecuador and Bolivia.