Photo by Joby Yellowdirt
Spotlighting initiatives like Nēwo Global Energy connects with Afros in Tha City’s dedication to intersectional allyship amongst Black and Indigenous groups.
If the spring of 2023 has taught us anything, it’s that the climate crisis is no joke. Homes, health, and access to necessary resources are just a few of the things being sacrificed amidst an unprecedented number of wildfires. While climate change solutions are typically packaged as long run government programs at best or greenwashing at worst, this Alberta-Based non-profit is taking a relational approach to climate action.
Nēwo (pronounced NAY-WO) is the Cree word for the number four and represents the four elements, seasons, directions and aspects of being human (mind, body, spirit and emotion). These values can also represent the four winds, and this is an important cultural number to the Cree.
Nēwo Global Energy is a renewable energy non-profit corporation based in Edmonton. They work to install solar energy grids in isolated Indigenous communities in Alberta. Officially established in 2016, they are involved in Indigenous-run and led initiatives. They firmly stand in their belief of providing opportunities for the communities that they work with and acting as stewards of the environment. I had the opportunity to chat with the operations manager of Nēwo, Sebastien Rioux and he relayed the message and mission Nēwo has taken on.
“I guess one of the biggest differences about Nēwo compared to most renewable energy companies is that we don’t believe in technology as the solution, we are much more human and we strongly feel that most of the issues like over consumption are a general inability to relate to ecology,” said Rioux. “For us, our approach is more relational and much more about inner work and inner transformation, and reconnecting with our four aspects.”
Nēwo approaches the issues of protecting the environment and enriching their communities by providing education to those who seek it for free. As of 2023, Nēwo has several ongoing projects, the most notable is The Abundance Project: Wêyôtan. The project aims to connect investors to green energy and uses funds to provide free education and training to Indigenous people barred access to employment.
“It's about healing the part of our western psyche that has caused us to do the damage to our ecology,” said Rioux. “The main reason we got into solar is because the sun gives every day and doesn’t ask for anything back and look what a love like that does. That type of generosity is what we wanted built into our organization.”
Nēwo has impacted the lives of many by giving them tools to learn and give back to their communities
Yellowdirt is from Alexis Nakota Sioux Nation which is located 80 kilometers west of Edmonton.
He is also a volunteer firefighter and witnessed first hand the destructive nature of climate change.
“I had a passion for renewable energy and had a concern for the future,” said Yellowdirt. “Then I became a climate change awareness coordinator for my community. That was getting the elders' stories and getting them to talk with the kids at the school.”
Yellowdirt became involved with the non-profit through a solar design training program with Nēwo and the Yellowhead Tribal College. He then went on to become a solar panel installer. Yellowdirt notes he found Nēwo’s training programs during a turning point in his life.
“It's not just the technical side of the program,” said Yellowdirt. “The other side is we need to be better to ourselves, we need to start healing those traumas that we have in our life, and then we can be better, be better for ourselves and we can be better for our family or our communities.”
Yellowdirt now works as program lead for the non-profit and is planning more to aid other people out of the low point he found himself in.
“I want to develop something like that where we can give people the skills to confidently get out of bed every day and go through the whole day with the skills to take any negative thing that comes our way with pride or strength and courage,” said Yellowdirt.