BBC World News

Israeli energy venture, Comet-ME, has been selected as a finalist in World Challenge 09, the worldwide competition seeking to identify and reward projects and businesses which bring economic, social and environmental benefits to local communities through grassroots solutions.

The Comet-ME Project provides basic energy services for off-grid communities in the occupied Palestinian territories, in a way that is both environmentally and socially sustainable. These energy services include the required hardware and the local capacity to maintain and install existing and additional systems.

The community benefits from night time illumination and communication with the outside world. Additionally, the ability to refrigerate and store milk and dairy produce also increases the potential for generating revenue and reducing the cycle of chronic poverty.

BBC World News will broadcast six 30-minute programmes profiling each of the World Challenge 09 finalists, showing how their projects and businesses are changing lives and local communities. In addition, Newsweek will detail the projects in six advertorials. The audience and readers are then invited to vote online www.theworldchallenge.co.uk - for their favourite project or business from 28 September.

The winner of World Challenge 2009 will be announced at an awards ceremony in The Hague in December.  The winner will receive a US$20,000 grant from Shell to invest in their project, plus the two runners-up will each receive US$10,000.