When a hurricane brings down power lines or attacks cripple a national grid, renewable energy in disaster relief means one thing in practice: solar panels and batteries that keep a hospital, clinic or relief hub running on site. Documented examples, from Puerto Rico to Jordan and Ukraine, are almost all solar plus storage. But renewables are not yet the norm. Diesel generators still dominate humanitarian power, and solar mostly works alongside them.
People also ask what the transfer of energy has to do with natural disasters. NOAA describes a hurricane, to a first approximation, as a heat engine: it takes heat from warm, humid air over the tropical ocean and releases it when water vapour condenses in thunderstorms. That energy transfer from sea to atmosphere powers the storm. When the storm reaches land, it can destroy the poles, lines and substations that carry electricity, which is where local solar and storage can help.
How it works
The core technology is simple. Solar photovoltaic (PV) panels generate electricity from sunlight, and batteries store it for use at night or in cloudy weather. Together they can run as an isolated “island” of power, or microgrid, separate from a failed grid.
In an emergency the priority is critical loads: medical equipment, vaccine and medicine storage, lighting, phone charging and communications. Systems can be set up on rooftops, in car parks or on open ground. Unlike diesel generators, they do not need a steady supply of fuel, and the UN refugee agency UNHCR notes that diesel brings difficult logistics and variable fuel prices. The WHO describes decentralised solar PV with batteries as cost-effective, clean and quick to deploy, and notes that generators in health facilities are often not working. For a general explainer on the technology, see our guide to solar energy.
The physics of the storm
Ocean surface water needs to be about 27 °C (80 °F) and warm to a depth of about 46 m (150 ft) to fuel a tropical cyclone, according to NOAA. When water vapour condenses it releases latent heat, warming the surrounding air and driving stronger cloud growth. NOAA estimates the heat released by condensation in a typical hurricane at about 6.0 × 10¹⁴ W, which it compares to 200 times world electrical generating capacity, and the kinetic energy of the winds at about 1.5 × 10¹² W, about half. These comparisons use world capacity at the time NOAA wrote them, not today’s. Strong winds also churn up cooler water, which can lower sea-surface temperature by several degrees Celsius; this is one reason storms weaken after passing.
Real-world examples
Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria (2017)
More than a month after Hurricane Maria struck in 2017, about 85% of Puerto Rico was still without power. Restoration took months, and hundreds of thousands of people did not regain grid power until almost a year after the storm.
On 24 October 2017, Tesla announced it had begun building a solar-plus-battery microgrid at Hospital del Niño, a children’s hospital in San Juan. Hospital representatives said the array had more than 700 solar panels plus Tesla Powerpack batteries, set up in the car park. The system was later moved to a permanent dedicated area, with 776 panels, 200 kW DC / 150 kW AC of solar and five Powerpacks storing 475 kWh. Governor Ricardo Rosselló said at the time that Tesla was working with at least seven other critical sites, including Susan Centeno Hospital in Vieques.
Community solar mattered too. In Adjuntas, the community organisation Casa Pueblo had a solar-powered headquarters that kept power after Maria. It became a relief hub where people came for dialysis, respiratory therapy, medicine storage and phone charging, and its radio station kept broadcasting. Casa Pueblo later built a community solar microgrid with nearly 700 rooftop panels, reported in April 2023.
Refugee camps in Jordan
Jordan’s two large camp solar plants are long-term humanitarian settings rather than acute disaster response, but they are among the best-documented cases.
UNHCR switched on a 2 MW solar PV plant at Azraq camp on 17 May 2017. UNHCR and the IKEA Foundation call it the first solar plant built in a refugee setting. It supplies about 20,000 Syrian refugees in almost 5,000 shelters in the two villages connected to the grid. The IKEA Foundation gives its funding as €8.75 million from its Brighter Lives for Refugees campaign; PV Tech gave US$9.6 million for the same project. At launch, the organisations expected savings of US$1.5 million and 2,370 tonnes of CO2 a year, and planned an upgrade to 5 MW; we could not confirm whether the upgrade happened.
On 13 November 2017, a 12.9 MWp solar plant was inaugurated at Zaatari camp, which UNHCR described as the largest solar plant ever built in a refugee setting. The German government funded it through KfW Development Bank with €15 million (US$17.5 million), and BELECTRIC Gulf built it. Power for the camp’s more than 80,000 residents was expected to rise from 6–8 hours a day to 12–14 hours a day. A good-practice summary estimates a saving of about 260,000 tonnes of CO2 over 20 years.
Ukraine: hospitals during grid attacks
According to UNDP data cited by the charity Direct Relief, attacks in winter 2022–23 destroyed 61% of Ukraine’s electricity generation capacity and left about 12 million people without power. In March 2024, Direct Relief said it was buying and donating more than 2,000 battery systems for hospitals and emergency hubs. Ukraine’s health minister said at the same time that medical institutions had been provided with more than 10,000 generators, a sign that generators remain the main back-up.
Several separate programmes have added solar. The World Bank-financed HEAL Ukraine project lists 130 solar installations (panels, inverters and batteries) at health facilities. In one example from a World Bank feature in November 2025, a clinic in Myrotske installed 29 panels (15 kWp) in January 2025; it can run for 36 hours without external supply and saved about 50,000 UAH (US$1,200) over eight months. The Netherlands-funded SOSH-U project covers off-grid solar at 24 facilities (23 hospitals and one school) from December 2024 to December 2025. The Ukrainian NGO Ecoclub Rivne says it has installed 28 solar power plants at hospitals over two years, and in 2025 Greenpeace was working with the Biohaus Foundation to ship solar and storage kits to Ukrainian hospitals. These programmes overlap and are counted differently, so there is no single national figure for Ukrainian hospitals with solar. For wider context, see our report on Ukraine’s path to energy resilience.
What the numbers say
The clearest numbers in this field are about diesel. A survey by the Global Platform for Action (GPA) Coordination Unit, published in December 2022, estimated that six UN agencies and the ICRC operate 11,365 diesel and petrol generators in displacement settings. They spend more than $100 million a year on fuel and emit almost 200,000 tonnes of CO2e. The GPA calls this a conservative estimate and says fuel use is largely unmonitored. Grid connection is often not an option in these settings, because there is no grid, connection is expensive, or local grids suffer brownouts and blackouts.
Against that, the solar examples above are significant but small. The Azraq and Zaatari savings figures (US$1.5 million a year and about 260,000 tonnes of CO2 over 20 years respectively) are estimates made by the organisations involved. The Myrotske clinic’s saving of about US$1,200 over eight months is a single World Bank example.
Portable solar plays a smaller role. Welsh company Sure Chill shipped 200 vaccine-cooling units to the Philippines for UNICEF after Typhoon Haiyan, according to the Welsh Government in 2017. Little Sun, which makes solar lamps, lists humanitarian work in Ethiopia, Greece, Nepal, Niger, Rwanda, South Sudan and Ukraine, among others. We Care Solar’s Solar Suitcase, with a 100 W panel, 240 Wh battery, four LED lights and a fetal Doppler, is used in health clinics without reliable power.
Sunlight also helps with water. SODIS (solar water disinfection) means leaving water in PET bottles in the sun for 6 hours, or 48 hours if cloudy. According to its developer Eawag, the WHO accepts it, and it is recommended after natural disasters. For scale, the Sphere humanitarian standards set about 15 litres of water per person per day as the minimum indicator in emergencies.
Limitations / honest assessment
Solar is not a complete answer, and the evidence shows it.
First, diesel still dominates. UNHCR describes diesel as “effective in the short term” but notes variable fuel prices, difficult logistics, high maintenance costs and a large environmental impact. Solar output depends on the weather, and batteries add cost and wear out, so most sites still keep generators.
Second, the documented relief deployments are solar plus batteries. Wind turbines, bioenergy and hydropower in flooded areas are sometimes suggested for disaster relief, but we found no documented relief deployments of them; they remain untested ideas in this context.
Third, scale. A microgrid can keep a hospital or a community hub running, but in Puerto Rico hundreds of thousands of people waited almost a year for the grid. Local solar was a lifeline for specific sites, not a replacement for the grid.
Fourth, maintenance. Panels, inverters and batteries need trained technicians and spare parts, which are hard to find in remote or conflict areas.
The direction of policy is towards cleaner power. UNHCR launched its Global Strategy for Sustainable Energy in 2019, and the Clean Energy Challenge, launched at the 2019 Global Refugee Forum, aims to bring affordable, reliable and sustainable energy to all settlements of displaced people and nearby host communities by 2030. UNHCR’s Green Financing Facility is reported to be in progress at 40 sites in 14 countries (2026). Many of the same issues arise for off-grid communities generally; see our piece on renewable energy for remote locations.
The UK angle
The clearest UK link is industrial rather than operational: Welsh company Sure Chill supplied 200 vaccine-cooling units for UNICEF’s Typhoon Haiyan response.
At home, you can follow how electricity is being generated in real time on our live GB electricity mix page. Householders thinking about solar and batteries for back-up should be aware that whether a system keeps running in a power cut depends on how it is installed, and that costs and any savings depend on the home and tariff. Check current scheme rules on GOV.UK or with an MCS-certified installer. For the broader case, see why switch to renewable energy.
Frequently asked questions
What does energy transfer have to do with natural disasters such as hurricanes?
NOAA describes a hurricane as, to a first approximation, a heat engine. It takes heat from warm ocean air and releases it when water vapour condenses, which drives the storm. Ocean water needs to be about 27 °C to a depth of about 46 m to fuel one. The storm’s winds can then damage the infrastructure that carries electricity.
How is solar power used in disaster relief?
Solar panels with batteries power hospitals, clinics and relief hubs on site when the grid is down. Documented examples include a children’s hospital microgrid and the Casa Pueblo hub in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria, and solar at Ukrainian health facilities. Large plants also power refugee camps in Jordan.
Why do aid agencies still rely on diesel generators?
UNHCR calls diesel “effective in the short term”, though costly and hard to supply. A 2022 survey estimated that six UN agencies and the ICRC run 11,365 diesel and petrol generators in displacement settings, spending more than $100 million a year on fuel. Grid connection is often not viable in these settings.
Which refugee camps run on solar power?
Two documented examples are in Jordan. Azraq camp has a 2 MW plant, switched on in May 2017 and described by UNHCR and the IKEA Foundation as the first in a refugee setting. Zaatari camp has a 12.9 MWp plant, inaugurated in November 2017, which UNHCR described as the largest in a refugee setting.
How have Ukrainian hospitals kept the power on during grid attacks?
Mainly with generators: the health minister said more than 10,000 had been provided to medical institutions by March 2024. Batteries and solar have been added through separate programmes, including Direct Relief’s battery donations and the World Bank’s HEAL Ukraine project with 130 solar installations. There is no single national count of hospitals with solar.
Did solar help Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria?
Yes, at individual sites. Tesla built a solar-plus-battery microgrid at Hospital del Niño in San Juan while about 85% of the island was still without power, and Casa Pueblo’s solar-powered headquarters in Adjuntas became a relief hub. The grid itself took months to restore, and for hundreds of thousands of people almost a year.