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>> Thank you so much I would like also to say a couple of words about Dr must know he's coming he's a professor of microbiology. The only way to see that there were 2 recall in my eye where is the University of Puerto Rico in Milan whereas he is also the executive director of where Rio is a community organization in out who were to recall I was formed in the 1980 our own issues involving the conservation of our environment and Dr muscles work is is very well known both his academic work and he social work has been recognized by many.

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Partners it has been featured or a covert by different media outlets journalists or us now all me Klein now they have. Really. Produced by Google Earth so please welcome. Help me welcome Dr must all I'm going to pass in the bathroom. When I think. One of those years where he's blind trust to bring me here to.

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Georgia Tech. Ward. Talk to you when I am not a filmmaker I don't know if you heard him am I microbiologist and I am not an electrical engineer not a filmmaker I don't. And yet I'm going to talk to you about both of that. The only thing I can say is that this year I got the Brother Gene brother in very fellowship I don't know if you know who's Gene Roddenberry but he's a creator of Star Trek so at least I'm somehow related to the film but the industry let's say but I'm going to say something at the end that might save.

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And I got to talk to you today I come from Puerto Rico this island in the Caribbean Yes we are surrounded by water which is a great play and it's a beautiful island blessed with a lot of natural resources not we. Don't have natural gas we don't have.

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There any carbon we have sun we have water we have biomass we have a lot of biodiversity so around in our island and we yes and we have a lot of planes of fresh water for agriculture for industrial development for for the people of Puerto Rico. So I want to invite you to come at some point in and visit Puerto Rico and enjoy the beauty of our island.

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But I come from from the center of the island from the contrary he battles we're called heroes and sometimes I say I said. You know way to tease people from the mountain from the countryside now you all know your heroes because you're from the mountains and yes he were from from mountains of Idaho and and I'm going to tell you.

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Not about electrical engineering but I'm going to tell you. What we think where we believe ought to be done and what we have been doing for the past 39 years. And who has That's gusts up where we go from above we have been running with solar power since 1999.

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Like. Breeding I mean we feel we're generating the energy at the point of consumption will because we need energy and we cause we are promoting conservation and in order to do that you have to balance your statements with your actions so if we are talking about reducing the Puerto Rican ecological footprint we have to do it so that's why we have been running with solar power.

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We have a border fly garden in class up where low where kids in visitors can go and see the full cycle of the border fly. We have an equal call G. lab we have a school of music we have. OUR GALLERY. Or a library in class up where lower B.C. tourists go we even build a school inside a forest to draw lessons from the forest for sustainability for sustainable development so so you can the actual curriculum is a forest and you go there to learn how the forests east working and how as you see in this solar power for photosynthesis and how you can yield that solar power instead of photosynthesis for electrical purposes or you can learn on how the how the surface of the of the forests is impacting the water cycle and you can do actual actually experiment and draw lessons from from observations so he's active for learning is not just outside learning is learning from the outside from the color G. to see what we can too.

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To reduce our ecological footprint this is my mother to empty the she's a founder with my father of. $1980.00 and and we knew nothing about radio and communication and yet we have been running the 1st. Community radio station for the past 10 years so that radio class up where low.

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We knew nothing about film and solar cinemas and I'm going to tell you what we have been learning for for the past one year as well so so this is a great tool to contact and to be in touch with people in the mode of radiographs up oil is their boys of last our low Baucus investor I haint is the boys they radio station is the boys of the waters the forest and the people of the forest as a means of biodiversity.

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And everything we do is address in the plan C. Puerto Rico is a highly dependent colonial territory of the US and we have to break dependencies. And one of that dependency is the economical dependence we have been brought on in our organization self driven by selling a mother a slab This is our brand and we have been doing that for more than 30 years and that's how we get the funding that we need in order to move forward for basic projects and that give us freedom we're on the pen from someone from the outside that brings Bonnie to tell us what to do no no if you want to build your own boys and create your own edge Enda you need to be economically self-sufficient so from other ways laced one way to to achieve that.

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And he's based on the culture of working you have to work in order in order to earn resources to change your reality so that's Gus upwelling general again. It is a community based organization based on bolter work we where we were born in 1980 when when the government multi-nation of companies wanted to do open pit mining up in street mining in the center of the island and we decided that economical project was was not compatible with Lang conservation because the means for forests traction is very destructive in continental areas much worst in islands like Puerto Rico so we decided to oppose open pit mining.

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And we call for 4 challenge either in mining and this is our 1st event on the one person sure walk but the main square when we were calling. The opposition to to the mine to the mining mining proposal. So we knew at that point that science and knowledge was not enough you can.

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You can know all lot about one each you but that doesn't mean you're going to create a or promoted change you have to do much more than that just knowing the right answer so we decided to to link to merge signs with called community as a social equation for change and I'm not going to tell you the details but what it took was 15 years to eventually stop the open pit mining proposal so this is the same main square now 4 with $10000.00 people showing up to to celebrate a change in public policy towards mining in the island and from from opposing we were always pushing for 4 Pro Bowl scene and engaging in an Internet if that was how we want to use our energies just not to stop things that are not good for the community but actually promoting the one that you think are good this is one another thread that we face late 20 years after the government wanted to do a natural gas pipeline through the center of the island going through the forest the watershed and we said that was also incompatible with our reality and because we knew our social question is science culture and community at that time for the 1st event instead of one person showing up we had 30000 people going to the mountains and say now the pipeline is you know that's not good either we need something much better.

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But again we're about propose him I'll turn it if we propose a forest where managing to stay for is the 1st community engagement actively in protecting natural lands and this is what we do on a daily basis. This is a photograph of our planet in in September of of of 2017.

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Is Already this the solving the he reckoned that impacted Houston and I'm flooded Houstonian was very bad is going near by the north of Puerto Rico you can not see it we were fine at that time we it had some created some damage in the island but not it not as bad so he kept going and I think that was he eventually many of the Caribbean islands were badly damaged with horse A was coming along and Maria was not even in a tropical depression at that time we thought we we had saw the worst part of the Here again season in Puerto Rico and yet 2 weeks after Wilma less than 2 weeks after Maria came and that's that's my horse is still here I can almost reach in North Carolina and impacting the East Coast of the U.S. And Mary is actually going all over Puerto Rico that September 17th 2000 and.

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September 17th 2017 think number. And and he reckoned I mean it was a storm it was a tropical depression at what point eventually become a storm we thought. It is not going to have nothing is going to happen God is going to bless the island again like it does and bless the other island but Puerto Rico we have something special seems like but but the.

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But you know the illusion that was was all of her. After that day. It was a storm on Friday by Monday it became a Category one hurricane. Nguni it was a Category 32 in the afternoon it was Category 3 by the end of these talk for e will it was a Category 4 and that night the same night it was a Category 5 hurricane with sustained winds of 170 miles per hour hours that's what global warming is doing with with with the weather especially in the Caribbean the frequency of the storms the size of the storm that is almost a size of France.

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Amount of water the heat and the water the fallout to the clouds and the forces of the winds are a combination of how a natural event like a hurricane becomes like a really. Threat to human life caused by human activity mostly related to the burning of fossil fuels for energy purposes and Puerto Rico chain fully is running on fossil fuels the same ones that are creating the problem 98 percent is based on petroleum coal and natural gas it means.

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$2500000000.00 a year of money from our economy that goes out to paid for the fuel soo it is for $4.00 economies it's not good but this is basically what happens when you have an obsolete system based on centralized power generation you need transmission lines you need distribution lines and with almost acting in 40 you're in for a C.E.O. it here again that it has a really strong forces you know that infrastructure with the measurements lack of maintenance I mean we have a real combination for 40 disaster a human disaster from a natural event.

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So people after that relied on power generators to save their own self from the blackout that lasted weeks month almost a year for many and when you're use in a power generator now you're relying again on fossil fuel so you have noise you have air emissions. Still it is a problem but not because up where look us up we're lost was fine and because we're generating energy at the point of consumption we were able to to return to some sort of normality the day after people were getting in there and using gas up or less an energy always is to plug in their respiratory equipment to recharge personal equipment.

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To receive some sort of support and that support included our campaign to light up Puerto Rico with the sun and with these 314000 solar lamps that were channel from from universities and people in the state sending them to muddy. The Euston and we get in like you many 1000 flights to Puerto Rico when the airport was actually close.

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And we got much more that than the lamps we got in school and we got water filters we got different support for the community so we're very happy and blessed and actually grateful to the people that actually mobilize and self in the diaspora to help or to recover so discards an example of one of those solar lamps is sort of like us up well above but here they're generating the the energy there is a store energy storage small battery and the purpose of the of the energy is for lighting a space to improve quality of life within the crisis but all through also thinking about educating people on how easy is simple in expenses safe is to embrace these this type of technology and going to their brutal areas you instead of people hanging the clothes to dry them they were hanging their solar lamps during the day to 2 to grab the energy from the sun and then using the lamps at night from there we decided to to power.

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Houses that had special medical needs like to run a dialysis equipment that requires 10 hours of operation so we set up. A solar sits system with a battery system. And the 9 others will guard the equipment and also a small fridge running on solar power to keep safe the insulin.

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And this is Brother look at Steel one of there is solar you stellars that were that he's working with ours and the machine was was running after after that perfectly and we have done it with others in order to address food security we decided to normalize the diet of many by installing 55 solar 3 church in rural communities and them them sorry and them because they're so energy efficient you don't need much.

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Power to run the rich so so now with one solar panel you can you can help people outside. And use energy for them to generate energy at the point of consumption we were addressing a humanitarian response but to change reality not to perpetrate the same thing this is one way of addressing a crisis and promote a change because now those families they keep this the fridge and they're operating they're saving money because now they're operating the rich out of the grid and if something happens in the future they what they have to do is pull the solar panel inside.

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Inside wait for the storm to be over and then you're back on track so this is a mean to to actually build resiliency this is in our school before a school that building was gone because of the heroic and now we have a new thrush or. Better the strength it is much better but he's running on solar power and now he's a solar lab for people that goes into the forest they learn how photosynthesis work but also how solar power can be used to yield electrical energy this is.

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This is the. Hard worker and we decided you know. There right off energy for everyone this is a poor resident that needs help and knowledge her house became black like us upward she is running now 100 percent on solar power. And with that we have done 60 additional houses that are running for the on solar power so we I mean cuss up or no we are no longer the only energy always is for the community now you have 60 energy always is all distributed across the across town for economical activation now the barber from from who is running on solar power and the conversation on how to switch from solar I mean from the traditional electrical grid to solar power now the conversation is taking place at the barber shop.

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And people are named and now the the other businessman they they learned this one. Can we do the same thing. He said electrical bill it went from $80.00 a month to $5.00. And $75.00 a month means a lot for people that the average income in Puerto Rico is $11000.00 so saving 800 dollars 800 dollars a year is is very significant.

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What about doing to hardwares the. Restaurant the plays. What about doing 5 grocery stores many markets in rural areas where people get their food now there's 5 brutal grocery stores that are fully running on solar power having economical saving I mean we do see their operational cost is helping they them to state in business and provide that service to their community while they keep you know the jobs for their local people so this is how we have been doing.

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It through transformation all of this within a year this is since the here again a year and a half what about like I said the lady called thought of the farmer's place or the fire station the emergency unit What about doing the elderly home that they can run on solar power so so when we're doing this.

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We're also transforming our so. The and this is our radio station. And that guy who was on the on the air before during and after the he reckoned but we had to reduce the air time because I were a radio tower away from the radio station I mean up in the mountains we you know powered collapse so we were running on a on a power generator and we had fuel limitations so we decided to change that as well so now our radio station is running on and solar power not only the station but also the transmission tower which she says is a message for all the private companies that also failed to Puerto Rico.

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And not only the public utility the energy the public utility the communication was also a failure because all of that transmission towers a collapse after the reckon why not producing energy at the point of consumption and at least guaranteeing some air time because you're generating energy over there if you need a power generator you can use it as an Internet if energy source not 24 hours a day you can use it for want 2 hours depending on when how the sun is he's out there to recharge the batteries and you can you can save fuel and you can last longer and provide the service to the community so what we have been doing is changing the energy landscape of Puerto Rico.

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As a reference for what can be done for Puerto Rico can we change that centralized model to one of these 3 with it energy generation at the point of consumption where is needed free of the risk of of the collapse of transmission and distribution lines what we're showing is that it can be done and this is for for Juan Carlos this is our 1st installation 20 years ago in vehicles in one of the civil disobedience camps that lady that is collecting samples he is least we are that is right here she completed her master's degrees at the University of Puerto Rico now she's a Ph D. student from in cost us content they need these lab here at Georgia Tech evaluating in this case.

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Heavy metals and explosive pollution at this former bombing range but the civil disobedient camps that actually was a social power to stop. The bombing from from continuing in the island of the ECUs after 60 years and having the highest cancer rating because we help them. With a solar installation.

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Was a humble frame to run a light and it was for communication purposes and this is 20 years and back now you can see how weak we have been learning we have learned a lesson and now we can help others and do bit much better installations or this is our 1st one but But what about the link with other needs of the community what about this is about the what about returning the possibility of people in the who lost their access direct access to a seen them on 30 years before and we decided why not build in we I mean we are addressing communications economical activation we're dealing with the right of energy for the houses.

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Food security the health to run a special medical equipment what about entertainment. What about having a solar seem him out before you reckon before the next you reckon you know that the day after day you reckon or 2 days after you can have the community gathering in this common plays and the least reduce the tension we gain some sense of normality within everything that is going on I mean a solar cinema is a great idea for the community is a place where you can you know you can have the people get it pull in getting together organizing what are we going to do and people did what are the source these are all we're going to we open the roads we're going to do this and that and that's how Porto Rico actually rebound from the bottom up after hearing Maria but we decided that we wanted a solar cinema and we told the Conti we're going to build a solar cinema in our institution in cus up we're low so that's in February of last year.

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What do.