Powering Post-Disaster Relief: Inside Onyx’s Partnership with Footprint Project
The ongoing collaboration is set to install solar panels donated by Onyx to provide cleaner energy to communities in need following extreme weather events.
As climate change exacerbates extreme weather events, coordinated post-disaster relief efforts are needed now more than ever. Immediate recovery actions are key — and they’re much more effective when they come with long-term solutions that build community resilience.
Onyx Renewables is excited to have partnered with New Orleans-based nonprofit Footprint Project to build out mobile microgrids to aid relief and recovery efforts following hurricanes and other disasters. The program kicked off this summer in Houston in the wake of Hurricane Beryl, where volunteers from Schneider Electric and Onyx came together to install Onyx-donated solar panels on disaster relief trailers.
“Our partnership focuses on community and grid reliability,” explained Hema Gupta, Director of Procurement at Onyx. Gupta, who attended the partnership’s kickoff project in Houston, helped volunteers to construct panel racking for the trailers. The completed trailers — which will be used by Ground Force Humanitarian Aid, Information Technology Disaster Resource Center, the Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church Disaster Response, and Hope Disaster Recovery — will serve as mobile microgrids that help Houston access critical support and emergency services during future prolonged grid outages.
“There’s such a need to provide reliable power in a time following a natural disaster when no one has power, and we want to help communities get back on their feet quickly and sustainably,” Gupta added.
“By putting solar panels on our partners’ disaster relief trailers, we help them cut down the cost barrier of implementing renewable energy in their relief and recovery efforts,” said Jamie Swezey, the program director at Footprint Project. “We see ourselves as the conduit between the technology and the boots-on-the-ground partners that can help open the door for future projects.”
Partners in progress
The partnership with Footprint Project is more than a year in the making.
Onyx was looking to donate pallets of legacy modules to an organization that could put them to use giving back to the community. Footprint Project caught Onyx’s eye due to their reputation for helping disaster-hit communities to swiftly build back greener following times of crisis.
“What really stood out about Footprint was that, when disasters happened, they always had boots-on-the-ground teams ready to install the panels immediately,” Gupta explained. “Footprint has top-notch expertise in panel installation and has forged connections not only with volunteer organizations, but also with companies that donate their time to pick up and transport our panels,” added Gupta. “It’s important that we work with reputable parties to make sure everything goes smoothly and our panels are installed properly and put to good use.”
“There’s a lot of openness throughout Onyx that the partnership isn’t only about disaster relief in the short term, but also about building resilience,” Swezey said, noting that some of the donated panels will be distributed to disaster relief partners throughout the country for use in ongoing projects.
Disaster relief through distributed energy
Onyx’s panels comprise the largest solar panel donation to Footprint Project this year, as well as the largest donation of solar panels by a commercial and industrial solar developer to date.
Though five pallets of solar panels were already used in Houston, many more wait in storage for future disaster relief efforts. Gupta explained that Onyx proactively donated the panels before disasters hit so that they can be mobilized and rolled out more efficiently when needed.
“The panels’ effectiveness as a disaster relief tool really depends on how quickly they can be deployed in a rescue scenario,” she noted. “We really thought a lot about the accuracy and timing of how they’d be sent out.”
Still, there’s more than just how quickly energy is deployed after disasters — the source of power matters as well. Once solar-powered microgrids are installed, green electricity will help keep the lights on during future disasters or grid events.
Microgrids are already proven to help decrease widespread power outages during extreme weather events, but they often run on fossil fuels. In Houston, gas-powered microgrids kept many essential services online during the worst of Hurricane Beryl.
The irony is that continued post-disaster usage of fossil fuel generators contributes to more intense disasters more often.
“As climate disasters continue growing in frequency and intensity, using renewable energy to respond to them will help break that negative feedback loop of using fossil fuels to respond and recover from disasters that are exacerbated by climate change,” Swezey explained. “Especially in places like Puerto Rico and the Gulf Coast, we’ve seen firsthand that the fossil fuel supply chain can get disrupted during outages; renewable energy enables first responders to keep working even when there isn’t any fuel for generators.”
Replacing generators with renewable energy has other, more immediate benefits, too.
Swezey shared that one of the biggest pieces of feedback she’s heard from Footprint’s on-the-ground partners is that after the panels are installed, there’s no noise pollution. The traditional 20-40 kilowatt diesel generators are extremely loud and produce particulate matter and air pollution.
“It’s a huge relief for the community to be able to turn those generators off and use them intermittently,” she said. The money saved can then be used in other ways to support relief efforts. “There’s so much added stress from the noise — people visibly relax and their shoulders drop when the noise goes away.”
Renewable-powered microgrids are key for building community resilience during extreme weather events and cutting back emissions. And, after the storms are over, they can help keep the larger grid running smoothly and expand access to affordable clean power.
“Onyx’s work with Footprint Project is going to help transition us from a centralized grid to a decentralized grid with distributed assets,” said Gupta. “Our end goal is helping small-scale communities be able to power their own grids during and after disasters.”