Harnessing our energy for communities
Our commitment to involving and including communities is one of the pillars of our Sustainability Plan, and Enel has taken significant steps towards delivering on the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
A key factor in these projects is the Creating Shared Value (CSV) model in which partnerships with organisations working at both international and national level play a fundamental role. These organisations promote development through innovative interventions focused on – and linked to – very real and specific local needs. This is an Open Innovability approach in which sustainability, innovation and openness to dialogue lie at the very heart of the relationships with our stakeholders.
Enel for training and empowerment
The Enel Group (as of 31 December 2017) is present in over 30 countries, spread across five continents, with an installed capacity of around 85 GW, approximately 2.2 million kilometres of electricity lines and around 64 million clients.
In Brazil, for example, Enel has developed several projects designed to foster economic and social development within communities, and with an emphasis on individual rights. It is able to do so through its knowledge of the area and its needs.
“Enel Compartilha Empreendedorismo” (Enel Shares Entrepreneurship) is a project designed to help women who have been victims of violence, Marcia Massotti de Carvalho, Enel’s Head of Sustainability in Brazil, explains. The key term is capacitação, which literally means “empowerment,” and this concept also includes training: enabling people to do things, in other words. Such as recycling waste materials into saleable goods – bags, for instance. This means that the women are not only doing something that can make them economically independent but it also brings them into contact with other women in the same situation and the associations that can provide them with support. All this helps give them greater awareness of their rights. Recycling materials also slots nicely into the whole circular economy concept as it brings together both environmental and social sustainability.
“Enel Compartilha Oportunidades” (Enel Shares Opportunity), on the other hand, is a project aimed at disadvantaged urban areas, particularly the favelas. The initiative focuses on the quilombolas, who are the descendants of African slaves. Aside from providing training, the project also offers participants support in getting into the world of work, starting with such simple things as writing CVs, which can be a major stumbling block for some.
Access to the electricity grid is a basic community need that in some areas of the country has yet to be met. However, the “Liter of Light” project, which is run in collaboration with the NGO of the same name, aims to teach the local people how to build small solar generation units using plastic bottles and other recycled materials to guarantee themselves access to electricity. The “Luz solidaria” programme also offers our customers a discount on purchases of new electronic equipment on condition that they bring back their old devices and donate part of the money saved to social initiatives.
“Enel is committed to respecting the rights of communities and contributing to their economic and social progress, interfacing daily with a wide range of stakeholders”
Seeding Energies – Sustainability Report 2017
The Creating Shared Value model and Sustainable Development Goals
Since 2015 Enel has been adopting the Creating Shared Value model which integrates social and environmental factors into business processes and right along the entire value chain, with the aim of creating, managing and maintaining new assets. This is a huge commitment which is evident in around 1,200 projects and over 600 partnerships now benefitting over nine million people.
With regard to the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals, Enel made specific commitments to community relations in 2015: SDG 4 (Quality education), SDG 7 (Affordable and clean energy) and SDG 8 (Decent work and economic growth).
By 2017, approximately 600,000 people were benefitting from our training and education projects (SDG 4), 1.7 million people were benefitting from our access-to-energy projects (SDG 7) and 1.5 million people were benefitting from our decent work and economic development projects (SDG 8). That said, we intend, as part of our 2018-2020 Sustainability Plan, to boost those figures still further. Indeed, our target for 2020 is to ensure that 800,000 people benefit from quality education, 3 million from decent work and economic growth and that the same number again enjoy access to energy.
“We are the energy to express the full potential of each of us. We are the environment in which we live and the change to which we are devoted, every day. For this we undertake to safeguard our planet and promote social development. With passion and innovation. 365 days a year. In more than 30 countries. We are the communities in which we work and with which we grow. Because together we have the power to be sustainable”
Seeding Energies – Sustainability Report 2017