THE GREENATHON- Our big effort for the environment

NDTV is producing India's first ever 24-hour live event, THE GREENATHON that will be telecast across all NDTV channels to raise awareness about the environment and find ways to create a cleaner, greener tomorrow.

The Greenathon will help raise funds for TERI’s ‘Lighting a Billion Lives’ initiative to provide solar lanterns to villages that would otherwise be without electricity for a decade or more.

You too can become a part of this initiative. Here's how you can help;

To Donate- Cheques need to be made out to The Energy and Resources Institute payable in New Delhi and sent to the following address:

NDTV Ltd.,

Archana Complex,

Greater Kailash Part 1,

New Delhi- 110 048

(LABL should be written behind the cheque and it should be posted to NDTV in an envelope marked to the Green Team c/o environment campaign)

Lighting a Billion Lives

Over 1.6 billion people in the world lack access to electricity; roughly 25% are in India alone. For these people, life comes to a standstill after dusk. This campaign aims to bring light into the lives of one billion rural people by replacing the kerosene and paraffin lanterns with solar lighting devices. This will facilitate education of children; provide better illumination and kerosene-smoke-free indoor environment for women to do household chores; and provide opportunities for livelihoods both at the individual level and at village level.

In terms of physical targets, it translates into 200,000,000 solar lanterns in use, assuming that each solar lantern benefits five members of a family.

The Campaign uses solar lanterns that have CFLs as well as LEDs for dual purposes. The solar lantern, specially designed for the Campaign, lights up for 4–5 hours daily using CFL and another 6–7 hours using LEDs upon full charge of its battery.

Solar charging stations for 50 lanterns in each of the identified villages are set up and then managed by an entrepreneur who charges the lanterns daily and distributes them to households in lieu of a fee. One can adopt and light a family for Rs.3600 and an entire village for Rs.3 lakh only.

The Campaign offers local and global environmental benefits. Each solar lantern in its useful life of 10 years displaces the use of about 500–600 litres of kerosene, thereby mitigating about 1.5 tonnes of CO2.

However, since a solar lantern provides a much superior quality of illumination as compared to kerosene-based devices, it is prudent to compare it with lighting devices powered by grid-based electricity.