I recall my childhood in Romania with the long harsh winters punctuated by frequent power outages that left us in the dark cold with my only chance to prepare for the next week final exam by reading at candle light. I became quite skilled during that time at writing my homework with gloves (and don’t get me wrong! I was writing with pen on paper… since computers did not make it even in our dreams in those days…). I recall the cold water in the shower and my hands freezing while I was washing my school clothing…

I’ve had glimpses of those childhood episodes later on, as I ended up in Canada with its harsh winter storms leaving us without power sometimes for a few days in a row… Well… at least I was well trained in coping!… :-)

A few years back, when I found myself in the office of the Power Minister of Nigeria on a consulting trip I could hardly contain my frustration in front of life’s irony grinning yet again at me when we ended up discussing his anguish concerning 80% of the country population living in the rural areas without any source of electricity, yet having “a lot of Sun”!… We brainstormed around solutions but all our plans got strangled by the impossibility to find a reasonable way to guarantee to investors that the solar panels they were about to install will be paid for… It broke my heart — and his as well (I saw tears in his eyes…) — as we parted without much hope that we could help to bring light to those who so much needed it…

Hopelessly attempting to help the Minister of Power of Nigeria in 2014

But Blockchain is restoring back the hopes through its unique fabric which memorizes every transaction and can account for every payment while enforcing actions via smart contracts, such as automatic payments when a certain amount of energy was consumed, or switching off the solar panels if payments are not honored. So when I heard Veronica Garcia speak at the World Economic Forum in Davos about her ambitions to bring light to women farmers in the developing world with her Blockchain startup Bitlumens, I had my Eureka moment!

Bitlumens enables the transition to sustainable communities

Veronica’s ultimate dream is to use the enabling properties of Blockchain technology to give identities to the 1 Billion unbanked women around the world and by this to facilitate their participation in the economy. Here’s how:

The Blockchain capability to record immutable timestamped transactions which cannot be tampered with makes it an ideal medium for recording unique IDs. Bitlumens agents collect the Know your Customer (KYC) information from each farmer, store this on the blockchain and install the solar home system. The latter is paid in monthly installments of 12–18 USD for approximately 12 months. All transactions are recorded on the blockchain and at the end of the payment period farmers receive a credit score. In Africa there are over 20m solar home systems and users have to ask for a piece of paper that certifies they had actually paid for their micro loan. This certificate is then taken to the bank and unfortunately not every bank accepts it. Using Blockchain now Bitlumens is about to automate this micro loan payment certification and also provide users with that data so they can use it towards their credit score. Bitlumens is currently negotiating with a few banks in Guatemala so they accept the credit score provided on Blockchain thus getting that piece of paper which can easily get lost, misplaced or even tampered with — out of the way, thus streamlining significantly the process.

By making their data available for the calculation of credit scores, farmers can receive Bitlumens solar panels at a discount or a microloan from a bank. With the solar power received not only can they offer the much needed light to their children to learn, but also water their plants using solar water pumps and with the money made from selling the produce they can pay for the electricity (and devices). But it does no stop here — Veronica and her techies are working on the development of sensors which unlock the devices from anywhere in the world by using BLS tokens, making remittances less costly and directing the funds to pay for electricity or water bills of a family.

Biltumens is also working on sensors which can measure the degree of pollution thus opening the possibility to reward good behavior (e.g. not using kerosene lamps) with Blockchain mediated incentives (a sort of carbon credit tokens which run on the Bitlumens Blockchain). The tokens can be used to pay back the solar panels or to buy electricity from neighbors who have a surplus — thus rendering a microeconomy in which the respective communities can thrive.

But the innovative ways by which Bitlumens is leveraging the capability of Blockchain go even further to include the most advanced research in microgrids and big data and enable the economy of things to merge with the economy of people with humongous network effects at scale. Bitlumens is in the process of deploying 100 solar panels in Guatemala. While they will continue to elevate rural communities around the World, they will go on with plans to further expand into the urban environments to help cities become “smarter” and more sustainable.

No wonder that Veronica’s project was already endorsed by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on the Carbon Development Mechanism which allows emission-reduction projects in developing countries to earn certified emission reduction (CER) credits, each equivalent to one ton of CO2. These CERs can be traded and sold, helping developing nations reduce their CO2 emissions. And that’s exactly what the Bitlumens tokens do! With most of the world population living unsustainable lives — and since every effort undertaken so far only made the US SDGs look more like a hopeless dream than an achievable target, Bitlumens appears to be a true Messiah taking on some of the hardest challenges the UN is facing, among which: Affordable and Clean Energy, Sustainable Cities and Communities, Good Health and Wellbeing, Gender Equality.

Soon you will see the Bitlumens solar panels in your neighborhood — so follow us closely on Telegram (https://t.me/BitlumensNews) and get your tokens timely in our upcoming presale (May 29–31) and ICO (June 1–28) events, to be ready to embark on our transformational journey!