Activities of the Community Interest Company

1. Promote the development and use of renewable energies and sustainable development generally, alone or in partnership with other organizations;
2. Engage in the manufacture of renewable energy equipment;
3. Work with community-based organizations by:
   • Providing access to renewable energy technologies and training
   • Promoting collective and sustainable use of the natural resources for the common good
   • Supporting participatory and democratic processes in which communities define their own development models
   • Facilitating access to the resources necessary to fulfill these aims;
4. Support the work of non-profit technology centers that produce knowledge in fields of common interest (such as renewable energy, information and communication technology, agriculture, transport, etc) and thereby promote not-for-profit use of this knowledge, in particular by community-based organizations following existing and new licensing models such as Free and Open Source Software, Open Hardware and Creative Commons; and
5. Raise awareness about the challenges facing our planet and its inhabitants, and about ways to overcome them through positive solutions.

Yansa CIC is currently developing an innovative wind turbine technology. Our design concept is oriented towards high reliability and improved maintenance and repair procedures. Several novel elements should lead to a reduction in the amount of incidents, as well as to a reduction of downtime and repair costs when incidents occur. Yansa’s turbines will not be designed to be the cheapest machines in terms of initial cost; the aim of the design is to lower the costs per kWh produced over the full lifetime of the turbine.

Another key principle in Yansa’s approach to technology development is to design products that are robust and accessible. We will maximize the involvement of communities in Operation and Maintenance and optimize the communication and feedback between the users of the technology and our design teams. For example, some wind turbine manufacturers refuse to share with turbine buyers data produced by the sensors installed in their machines, or refuse to provide sufficient documentation. These and other practices create serious tensions between manufacturers and users, which make improvement and troubleshooting more difficult. We will take a very different approach, based on openness and cooperation with the users and third party service operators throughout the lifecycle of the machines.

We expect communities to play a growing role in the further development of our technology. The first community that we are working with (Ixtepec, Oaxaca) has already expressed interest in being actively involved in research and development. They want to devote part of their income to train young persons from the community in the technology, in order to join the Yansa CIC team.

We will also take pro-active steps to avoid early obsolescence of our products. All wind turbines are designed to be operative for at least 20 years, but most manufacturers neglect discontinued lines of products soon after they are out of warranty, making the operation of older turbines very difficult years before the end of their supposed lifetime. We will work with communities to increase the options available as far as spare parts are concerned, in order to minimize the dependency on Yansa on this field and secure availability throughout the lifetime of the turbines.

Once the technology is developed, we will set up manufacturing facilities in countries that offer positive conditions to community wind energy projects, possibly in areas were polluting industries are being phased out. Creating jobs and alternatives in such regions is one more dimension of a fair transition process, and the CIC would like to contribute to this process. The job creation that comes along with manufacturing activities will be helpful when lobbying governments to establish policies conductive to community-based renewable energy.

We will sell wind turbines in commercial terms to wind energy developers. We will apply ethical screens in our commercial sales activity, to ensure that we are not providing turbines to projects that displace local communities or violate human rights in any other way. But we will try to reach a large segment of the market that falls within our ethical criteria.

The CIC will supply renewable energy equipment in non-commercial terms to community projects supported by the Foundation. Yansa’s turbines will be made available to community projects in the most favorable terms that are possible without neglecting the repayment of debts or the investment in further R&D and productive facilities. Any profits that remain from sales in the open market to commercial projects will be donated to the Foundation, after repayment of debts, investment in future activities, and non-commercial supply of equipment.