Casa Pueblo

Description

Casa Pueblo is an environmental community organization based in Adjuntas, Puerto Rico. It began in 1980 as a cultural center and later became a self-supporting, community-run organization working from a house running on solar energy. Its mission is to explore, protect and restore the wild places and ecosystems of Puerto Rico through community participation, self-management and education.

The organization has led long-running campaigns on conservation and energy issues. In the early 1990s it helped stop gold mining operations in the Adjuntas area, and in 1995 it purchased Bosque del Pueblo, a nature conservation area it manages under an agreement with the Puerto Rican government. It lobbied successfully against a planned gas pipeline through sensitive areas of the island’s interior, and it operates a radio station and an environmental school offering courses and workshops.

Since 1999 Casa Pueblo has installed more than a thousand solar panels in Adjuntas to build community-owned renewable energy independence, supporting hundreds of homes and businesses. After Hurricane Maria left Puerto Rico without power in 2017, it served as an energy hub for the community and distributed thousands of solar lamps. It also runs a coffee cooperative, Madre Isla, grown on a self-sufficient farm maintained by community members and volunteers.