Become a volunteer at SOLAR

Why volunteer?

• You help build from the start. SOLAR is a young foundation. What you contribute now helps shape what the projects and the archive will look like.

• A fresh perspective helps. A good question or a different point of view can make the difference between a project that works and one that gets stuck.

• You learn too. You work with people from other fields and gain experience with real sustainability questions.

• Knowledge doesn't gather dust. We share what we learn openly, including through the SOLAR Archive at archive.solar.

What can you work on? The nine hubs

Our projects are divided into nine themes, named after Greek gods. Choose what appeals to you; you may choose more than one.

• Helios: Energy: research into solar energy, green hydrogen, geothermal energy and saving heat.

• Athena: Knowledge & education: sharing knowledge, creating teaching materials and recording experiments openly.

• Hephaistos: Materials & building: research into hempcrete, more sustainable cement, reuse and testing building materials.

• Demeter: Food: aquaponics, hydroponics, and growing algae and mushrooms on residual streams.

• Prometheus: Technology: developing tools, automating, repairing and 3D printing.

• Asklepios: Health: prevention and a healthy living environment, such as measuring water and food safety. Non-clinical: we provide no care or treatment.

• Persephone: Waste & cycles: circular waste processing, recovering raw materials and composting.

• Hestia: Community: research into participation and transparent decision-making, and how volunteers can have a say.

• Poseidon: Water: water purification, circular water use and dealing with heavy rain.

You can help without a technical background too

Besides the projects, there's work that keeps the foundation itself running. A selection:

• SOLAR Archive (archive.solar): as an archivist, collecting, organising and checking knowledge, or helping to test and improve the platform, which is still being developed.

• Communication and social media: writing posts, making photos or short videos, sharing updates.

• Website and technology: helping with the website or with archive.solar (for example web development, design, testing).

• Fundraising: thinking along about funds, grants and our planned Kickstarter campaign for the archive.

• Translation: translating texts from Dutch into English (and the other way round) for our English pages and the archive.

• Organisation and administration: helping with planning, taking minutes, keeping overviews up to date.

Is your talent not on the list? Sign up anyway and tell us what you can do. We'll look together at where it fits. Have a project idea of your own? Propose your project.

How does it work?

1. Sign up. Fill in the form below. It takes a few minutes.

2. Getting to know each other. We get in touch for a short conversation, online or by phone. We tell you where we stand and hear what you want to do and can do.

3. Get started. You begin with a concrete task that suits your interests and the time you have. You know who to turn to with questions.

What we offer

• Meaningful work on sustainability questions, in a foundation that is still very much being built.

• Students are welcome for an internship or graduation project, on any project that fits the foundation's positions and plans.

• Flexibility: you decide how much time you give. A lot of the work can be done remotely.

• One contact person within the foundation, for all your questions.

• On request, a reference letter about what you have done with us.

What we ask

• An interest in sustainability and a willingness to work together.

• That you let us know roughly how much time you have, and tell us if that changes.

• Care with knowledge and data: what we publish has to be right.

• Volunteers can receive an allowance within the statutory volunteer scheme (vrijwilligersregeling). We're a young foundation and spend every euro on our projects as carefully as we can. Thank you for wanting to give your time!