'Surviving the heat': Navajo families’ long struggle for electricity

FRANCE 24 English

Visit our website: http://www.france24.com  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English  Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/France24_en

Transcript

00:00Christine can finally have her TV and her fridge on at the same time.

00:05Like many Native Americans living on the Navajo Nation reservation,

00:09she's relied on a generator and small solar panels, which have provided barely enough power.

00:15But thanks to a team of volunteers, she's now connected to the electricity grid after decades of waiting.

00:21Sunrise, that was our only light, and then sunset.

00:25Right now, at night, we can use the sun, the electricity, which is really, you know, really good.

00:34A few kilometres away, Gilberta says she's been waiting for electricity all her life.

00:38I've been personally waiting 23 years, which is, you know, oh, within the next year, you'll get electricity.

00:48And that consisted of 23 years.

00:51And then finally, now we see the poles and we're like...

00:54Electricity is still a luxury in this region, home to the country's largest Native American reservation.

01:01More than 10,000 families remain without power, which means no air conditioning,

01:05even though America began producing electricity over a century ago.

01:09To address the gap, local authorities launched a humanitarian project back in 2019.

01:15Since then, electric companies from across the U.S. have been volunteering their services,

01:19working for free around two months each year, to bring light to those still waiting.

01:23But we're still trying to catch up with the rest of America.

01:26And so that surprises many people.

01:29They're saying, you know, why are there third world conditions that exist here in the United States?

01:34You know, their greatest country in the world.

01:36Why is this happening?

01:38The region is also being hit hard by climate change.

01:41Seasonal lakes are drying up, leaving some livestock dying of thirst.

Category

Transcript

Recommended