Solar Volunteers Bring Hope to North Carolina in Hurricane’s Wake

In the weeks following Hurricane Helene’s devastating impact on the southeastern United States, volunteers are helping bring much-needed solar power to the hardest-hit areas in North Carolina. The storm, which made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane on September 26, left a trail of destruction across several states, with flooding and landslides killing hundreds and leaving millions without electricity.

North Carolina suffered the worst of the storm’s wrath, with roughly half of the total 225 fatalities occurring there. Many communities in the western part of the state have been left isolated, without power, and struggling to access basic necessities. As the state works to recover, a small but impactful solution is emerging: solar power.

Bobby Renfro, a retired railroad worker in Tipton Hill, has been operating a community resource hub out of an old church, relying on a gas-powered generator to keep critical medical equipment running. “We have no resources for nothing,” Renfro explains, as he describes the challenges his community is facing. His generator powers refrigerators for insulin, oxygen machines, and nebulizers, but the constant noise and high fuel costs are taking their toll. He spent over $1,200 on the generator alone and continues to spend more on fuel transported by volunteers from neighboring states.

The lack of power is a dire issue for many. At least 23,500 homes and businesses in western North Carolina remain without electricity, leaving people unable to store medicine, pump well water, or even charge phones to apply for federal aid. Power restoration efforts have been slow as crews from all over the country and Canada work to rebuild damaged infrastructure in remote mountain regions.

While some residents depend on gas generators, these are expensive, dangerous, and not designed for long-term use. To address the pressing need for reliable power, organizations like Footprint Project have stepped in. The nonprofit, founded by Will Heegaard and his wife, Jamie Swezey, in 2018, specializes in providing sustainable energy solutions during emergencies. This week, they delivered a solar generator with six solar panels to Renfro’s community hub, providing clean, quiet energy to power essential devices.

Renfro expressed hope that this new system would offer his community some peace of mind, saying, “Seeing and knowing that they have a little electricity” is a significant comfort.

Footprint Project is expanding its efforts throughout the region, delivering solar microgrids, generators, and water purification systems to 33 different sites so far. The nonprofit sources solar equipment through donations from companies and purchases items funded by contributions. Their larger systems, like the industrial-sized “Dragon Wings” generators, offer substantial power for critical infrastructure.

Swezey noted that while solar power isn’t fully replacing gas generators just yet, it’s providing much-needed Support. “It’s all hands on deck with whatever you can use to power whatever you need to power,” she said. Volunteers like Hayden Wilson and Henry Kovacs, who drove in from Asheville, are helping distribute solar equipment to remote areas. They made deliveries to a community hub in Bakersville, where residents had been forced to use creek water to keep insulin cool in the absence of power.

Footprint Project’s operations are based out of a makeshift headquarters in Mars Hill, where Heegaard and Swezey coordinate deliveries and respond to requests for assistance. Their work is crucial, as some of the most vulnerable communities remain isolated by washed-out roads and downed trees. In some cases, the team has resorted to using mules or helicopters to deliver portable solar batteries to hard-to-reach locations.

The lessons Heegaard and his team learned from their volunteer work in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria are being applied here, as they recognize that power outages can have long-term, deadly consequences. In Puerto Rico, some communities went without power for nearly a year, and Heegaard witnessed firsthand how extended outages can lead to fatalities.

Utility companies like Duke Energy are also employing strategies learned from Puerto Rico’s recovery, including using helicopters to deliver new utility poles to areas that are otherwise inaccessible.

Though power restoration is underway, many homes and businesses may not be able to reconnect for months due to extensive damage. Footprint Project’s solar systems provide an essential lifeline in the meantime. As Swezey emphasized, the nonprofit will remain in the region for as long as they’re needed, acknowledging that the need for power won’t end once the grid is repaired.

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