IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - December 2019 - 16

of schoolchildren and hundreds of
communities enjoy the benefits of
clean solar lighting and energy. Other winners (Okra, Solar Worx, and
Connex Solar) brought the sharing
economy to energy access, demonstrating peer-to-peer "pay-as-you-go"
dc nanogrids. Other teams worked
to perfect more traditional ac, dc,
and hybrid minigrids (Havenhill
and X-Power), provide solar pumping for agr icu ltu re (Simusolar),
and create advanced energy "bricks"
for off-grid customers (Reeddi).
The EBL competition and EAW workshop were conceptualized, funded,
and organized by IEEE PELS and its
volunteers and staff, with strong support from regional volunteers and
sponsors. Sponsors of the EBL Global
Final include Kehua Technologies, ON
Semiconductor, Southern Company,
Vicor, Sungrow Technology, Texas
Instruments, and its EBL partners,

the Center for Distributed Energy
at the Georgia Tech and the IEEE
Foundation.
The teams have shown innovative,
sustainable, and viable approaches to
tackling energy access-demonstrating how access to electricity can be
liberating for families and communities, bringing about digital and financial inclusion, and improving their
livelihoods. Many of these solutions
are addressing critical humanitarian
challenges that require an integrated
approach to problem solving including technology, business, and social
impact. EBL teams have shown that
this new brand of sustainable entrepreneurship can address systemic energy
poverty. Many of the teams are either
already commercial with their solutions
or are poised to go commercial.
To see the solutions of all of the teams
competing in the Global Final, please
visit http://empowerabillionlives.org/

global-finalists. The next round of the
IEEE PELS EBL will begin in 2021. For further information on EBL and becoming
a donor, sponsor, partner, or volunteer,
please visit http://empowerabillionlives
.org. If you would like to make a donation,
please visit http://empowerabillionlives
.org/supporters.

About the Author
Deepak Divan (ddivan@gatech.edu)
is a National Academy of Engineering member, IEEE Fellow, and past
president of the IEEE Power Electronics Society. He is a professor and director of the Center for Distributed Energy
at Georgia Tech. He also serves as founder and chief scientist of Varentec, a company focused on grid edge control,
which is funded by a clean-tech venture
capital firm, Khosla Ventures, and investor Bill Gates. Varentec is his third
start-up company.

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IEEE Power Electronics Magazine - December 2019

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