Sacred Earth Solar empowers front line Indigenous communities with renewable energy. The Lewis Family Foundation and Grand Circle Foundation have partnered with Sacred Earth Solar to support the Tiny House Warriors in their fight against Trans Mountain Pipeline camps by providing the funding required to build four tiny homes.

One of the core tenets that helps guide our work is “Be in the Fight”. We know there are “David and Goliath” fights and the terrible giants can be huge, for-profit corporations with seemingly endless resources.  The Secwepemc Land Defenders are resisting construction on the North Thompson line of the Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline from crossing unceded Secwepemc Territory by placing ten tiny houses strategically along the 518 km Trans Mountain pipeline route to assert Secwepemc Law and jurisdiction, and block access to this pipeline.

In addition to destroying the land, rates of violence against Indigenous women are exacerbated in resource extraction zones. The work camps bring thousands of temporary workers to small communities, increasing violence against women, and drug and alcohol abuse to Indigenous communities.

This is one of the most serious threats to Secwepemc Territories. The Secwepemc have never provided and will never provide their collective free, prior and informed consent – the minimal international standard – to the Trans Mountain Pipeline Project.

The Secwepemcul’ecw Assembly promise any project that seeks to go through and destroy 180,000 square km of unceded territory will be refused passage. They stand resolutely together against any and all threats to their lands, the wildlife and the waterways.

They are going big, by going small –  by building these Tiny Houses. The Tiny House Warrior movement is the start of re-establishing village sites and asserting authority over unceded Territories. Each tiny house with off-the-grid solar power will provide housing to Secwepemc families.

The Tiny House Warriors are building something beautiful that models hope, possibility and solutions to the world.  They are committed to upholding their collective and spiritual responsibility and jurisdiction to look after the land, the language and the culture of their people.

According to the Tiny House Warriors, despite claims by the Canadian government that the pipeline is in the country’s best interest, it is not in the best interests of the Secwepemc Nation, whose oral histories and archaeological evidence confirm Secwepemc ancestors lived in the area since before the glaciers receded 10 thousand years ago.