Prince William announces the five Earthshot winners in Cape Town
The best five solutions each year get £1m
Prince William and The Earthshot Prize announced the five 2024 winners at a ceremony in Cape Town on Wednesday evening.
The winners were selected from 15 Earthshot Prize finalists from across the globe. They each won £1m (about R22,703,000) to help speed their solutions to scale.
The organisers say the Earthshot Prize searches the globe for game-changing innovations “that will help us repair our planet, awarding the very best five solutions each year with £1m to scale their work.
The five winners are:
- Advanced Thermovoltaic Systems, US, for Fix Our Climate
- High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, Global (120 countries), for Revive Our Oceans
- Keep IT Cool, Kenya, for Build a Waste-Free World
- Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative, Kazakhstan, for Protect and Restore Nature
- Green Africa Youth Organisation (GAYO), Ghana, for Clean Our Air.
Prince William said the world could be rich in possibility, hope and optimism.
“That is why The Earthshot Prize exists. To champion the game-changers, the inventors, the makers, the creatives, the leaders; to help them build upon the amazing things they’ve already achieved; to speed their innovations to scale and to inspire the next generation to create the future we all need,” said the prince.
About the winners
The winner for Fix Our Planet, Advanced Thermovoltaic Systems (ATS) has developed a simple, safe and scalable technology to capture waste heat and convert it into electricity, offering a solution for heavy industries like cement and steel production.
These industries require extremely high temperatures, which generate vast amounts of waste heat that is typically lost. ATS’s technologies have the potential to save gigatonnes of CO2.
An alliance of 119 countries with the ambitious goal to protect 30% of land and oceans by 2030, High Ambition Coalition identifies technical, financial and knowledge gaps and connects governments with technical assistance and funding.
Keep IT Cool (KIC) addresses the challenge of food spoilage by providing sustainable, localised Keep IT Cool (KIC) refrigeration systems that help small farmers and fishers preserve their produce. By installing solar-powered cold storage units where fish are landed, KIC significantly reduces spoilage and waste by ensuring the catch stays fresh and managing its transport to market.
Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative has achieved the almost unprecedented feat of saving the critically endangered Saiga antelope from extinction. This mission has grown into one of the world’s largest conservation projects and is focused on protecting and restoring Kazakhstan’s Golden Steppe, one of the world’s least-protected natural ecosystems.
A youth-led, gender-balanced organisation, GAYO uses its “Zero Waste Model” to drive behavioural change in waste management practices across Africa that cut greenhouse gas emissions and particle pollution, while also bringing additional income to communities.
Their goal is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and particle pollution in Ghana by 70%, compared to open burning, as well as divert a total of 4,000 tonnes of waste by 2030.
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