The Ministry of Higher Education and Technology has organized a Robot Contest (RoboCon), between Kenyan Universities and middle level colleges. The regional competition is taking place today at the Kenya Polytechnic. Here are the first looks at the Robots from institutions taking part in the competition.

University of Nairobi Robot

Kiambu Institute of Science and Technology Robot

Nairobi Technical Trainin Institute Robot

Kenya Technical Training Institute Robot, The Winner

Machakos Institute of Technology (MIT) Robot

Some video will come soon…

For more information on RoboCon click here.

For the lack of a cheap power supply in the City of Kinshasa, smart mechanics came up with this little stove that speeds up combustion by adding a little electric fan (hidden inside this tube that looks like being part of a flat spring). The fan itself is powered by (Chinese!) batteries and with the burning of charcoal, this quick stove obviously isn’t the greenest solution. But it works and does the job for those who will otherwise have no alternative.

Cedric also mentions on his blog post that it’s difficult to identify the inventor of this device. A perfect example of how low-cost technology easily gets adopted and/or modified (and why intellectual property rights are still a major issue in many places).

Mama solar cooker

Made only of cardboard and tin foil this cooker fold up into a neat little package. It apparently cooks potatoes and cabbage in just 1 hour!

She told me that she got it as part of a study – one solar cooker was given to every manyatta. She couldn’t rememer which organization was handing them out but she has adapted hers by putting her pot into a plastic bag which she says retains the heat better. She says she’ll continue using the solar cooker after the study and will even buy one  at Ksh 1,000.

She still has a 3 stone wood fire to cook meat.

I wonder what happens to this device when it rains…does the cardboard become a sodden mess?

Recycled art at Kitengela

Anyone who has been to Kitengela Glass near Nairobi will instantly recognize the works of art made from recycled glass, metal and other materials. Stunning works by local artists support a huge community of people and beautify gardens, offices, institutions and homes. I bet you aren’t expecting me to talk about crap right? Wrong!

Kigengela art glass

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Creating art from recycled glass takes a huge amount of energy. The glass recycling factory produces tiles, windows and other items, fueling it with used oil, butane gas and electricity. But now they are exploring the use of human gas, yes that’s right - it sounds disgusting, smells disgusting, but what a wonderful source of energy!

Pig for poo

Apart from the excrement from pigs, chickens, horses, donkeys, ostriches, Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 ducks, and geese

human wastes are collected … in these loos designed to keep you intrigued…

Loo seat

and seated for long enough to be ‘productive’.

poo bus

The wastes (no, not the human ones) are transported to the biogas production site in a specially designedloooong-armed wheelbarrow

Shit stirrer

where it is poured into this big pot, where it is stirred (not shaken) by a professional shit stirrer.

Fermentation

Then it flows to the fermentation pit to digest….

Fermentation system

Notice how the toilets are being constructed at the top end of the system. This allows the poo to flow directly into the first tank .. it flows by gravity to the fermentation tank and then a settling tank before the sludge flows out and down a drain into another holding tank out of the picture.

The gas is piped to the household kitchen and the glass art workshops,

while the waste sludge is extracted and used on the gardens, i.e. total recycling!

In addition the Kitengela Glass factory creates an odd assortment of jobs from artists to poop stirrers, farmers and  biogas producers… for more information read about Kitengela here.

Amazing isn’t it - The first example of Art from Fart

So when one of Kenya’s youngest architects, Mumu Musuvo and his boss Jim Archer told me about the Kibera community cooker two years ago I was very interested. They were looking for funding from the company I ran. I studied the design and took in the environmental implications, saw the potential but my company was not biting. We turned his company, Planning Systems down but I’ve been secretly monitoring the project which was adopted by UNEP and launched earlier this year.

This post is a massive send out to Planning Systems to congratulate them for being highly commended by judges in the Energy, Waste and Recycling category at the 2008 World Architecture Festival in Barcelona, Spain - it’s reported here on CNN. The communal cooker is turning rubbish into fuel to feed residents of one of Africa’s biggest slums, Kibera, 

turning rubbish into energy

Garbage is brought to the community cooker by volunteers shovel itinto one end of a giant concrete oven. At the other end are the hotplates where the community cook and boil water. 

“It might smell a bit but it doesn’t make  our food taste any different,” says Virginia Wamaitha, as she pours sugar into her steaming pan of chai – the gently spiced tea loved by Kenyans. “It will taste just like chai should.”

Any one for a cuppa?

The garbage to fuel oven is sponsored by UNEP as one way to clean up Kenya’s slums while reducing dependency on wood and charcoal to protect forests. The community cooker burns garbage and generates heat for sterilizing water, for ovens used by community groups, as well as individuals. The original concept was that a kikapu (basket) of garbage would equate to an hour of cooking time on the stove. 

What kind of garbage? Any, plastics, food wastes even clothes - anything that will burn really! But doesn’t that produce toxic fumes you ask?? This is what’s so clever about the project. Using technology that I don’t understand the oven burns at temperatures of up to 930 degrees F. which basically detoxifies many hazardous pollutants.

“It uses a superheated steel plate inside the incinerator box to vaporize drops of water. The oxygen released then helps burn discarded “sump” oil from vehicles – itself a pollutant in the slums – driving temperatures higher”.

The process is simple enough to be controlled by locally trained volunteers.

According to UNEP this is the first of its kind, and it cost $10,000. 

Personally I think it’s a brilliant  idea, a great solution to slum garbage disposal, water treatment and hygiene (hot water an be used for community showers, to clean toilets, and to cook meals - therefore is safer (no more unstable jiko’s with pots of boiling water that kids tumble into on the floor). Plus the cooker can be used for commercial purposes - womens groups are using the cooker to produce baked products like queen cakes (you know the ones - “coke and keki”

Imagine if this could be replicated in slums around the world, in IDP camps like Kakuma, Dadaab, and in hospitals, prisons, and schools. 

Don’t let me blow their trumpet - help share this important story. You can read more praise for this project here  and Rob Crilly on CS monitor has a detailed article here and its also here on Sustainable Development International website here and on Sustainable Footprint here

My brother Dominic Wanjihia invented this gadget which he calls Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4
Fine Lined Evaporative Cooler, for rural application in Somalia - the cooling of camels milk for transportation . He was working on a project for VETAID, Somali Pastoral Dairy Development Program - SPDDP,in Burao, Somalia June 2008. All this content belongs to Dominic who has allowed me to post it here- please seek his permission to use this content elsewhere dwanjihia@yahoo.com

Cool-box design Fine Lined Evaporative cooler

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Evaporative cooling technology

The evaporative cooling concept has been used for centuries in countless applications. Cooling occurs when a fluid changes state from liquid to vapor. Put simply, evaporation. In order to evaporate, the liquid requires energy or heat. It acquires this heat energy from its immediate surrounding. As the surrounding gives up this heat, it lowers in temperature or cools.

The rate at which evaporation occurs depends largely on two main factors, the amount of heat available and the humidity in the air.

The cooler must also be shaded from direct sunlight otherwise the surfaces absorb UV heat and warms up, becoming ineffective as a cooler.

In short

Evaporative cooling devices work most efficiently in windy, dry and shaded conditions

Charcoal cooler

Everyone knows how to make charcoal fridges. After carrying out extensive tests on evaporative coolers in hot arid Burao, Somaliland, with day temperatures as high as 36^OC in the shade, the charcoal would absorb ambient heat from the air and as opposed to cooling, would warm up the interior compartment.

Imagine wearing a wet thick winter jacket under the palms at a breezy beach. The jacket acts as a wetsuit and will insulate your body preventing heat from escaping.

Fine lined cooler

However, imagine wearing a wet skintight t-shirt in similar conditions. The water evaporates quite rapidly and cools your body.

I applied this concept to the cooler prototype pictured and achieved startling results. The cooler would drop as low as 15.5^OC at night when temperatures averaged 25^OC and maintain under 17^OC during the day at average temps of + 32^OC.

Evapocooler

Construction

An elevated metal box is lined interior and exterior with a fabric. In this case I used locally available corrugated galvanized iron sheets for the container and sisal sacking fabric for lining. The upper ends of the fabric overhang in a water trough that rings the top of the cooler. Capillary action causes the water to slowly trickle over the inner and outer surfaces. A small vent keeps the interior air circulating and wind guides or tunnels direct air flow over the exterior surfaces. A low speed small solar powered fan can be incorporated in areas where there is not a constant breeze.

How it works

The circulating air in the interior causes evaporation on the wet surfaces. The necessary energy is acquired from the contents hence cooling them and is transfers to the iron sides.

Wind guides or tunnels direct an airflow over the external sides. The evaporation that occurs acquires energy from the sides causing further cooling of the interior.

Convection current system to increase water bath cooling

Construction design

Cool-box with water-bath interior for rapid milk cooling application– Collection Point Cooler

Walk-in cold-room for vegetable storage

Vehicle mounted for long distance transporters

Features (Comparison to conventional charcoal coolers)

Very simple construction

Corrugated galvanized iron or GI sheets increase the surface area

Wind tunnels guide air flow efficiently over evaporation surfaces

Air flow coolers at tunnel entrances

Being galvanized, the sheets are long lasting

GI sheets are affordable and available in most rural areas

Secondhand sacking fabric is available in virtually every vegetable market

The simple capillary action dripping system replaces more complicated dripping apparatus

Convection current system to increase water-bath cooling efficiency

Cool box design with waterbath for rapid drop in temperature of milk

The design simplified

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In hot arid regions, cooling the warm ambient air before it reaches the wet evaporation surfaces increase efficiency. Note. Setup for airflow from either direction

level coolers – achieved low’s of 16OC at ambient temp of 30OC +

Rapid Temperature Drop Test 4 lts boiling water in aluminum milk churn placed in water-bath at 16OC

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For further information and other rural development concepts and innovative designs, Dom can be reached on

mobile tel +254 722 700 530 dwanjihia@yahoo.com

A small group of innovative conservationists have come up with a solution to save the Virunga National Park in eastern Congo from destruction by charcoal producers who are devastating the forests to serve the needs of Goma’s burgeoning population of displaced people.

Their approach to ending the dependence on charcoal is to provide an alternative form of energy - briquettes made of organic wastes. Here are some photos of the gadget and results!

The briquette press

Piston Cylinder with holes

Briquette press at work

Briquettes drying out

A traditional Jiko adapted and fueled on briquettes

“The beauty in these briquettes is that they are made from what has been considered, up to this point, waste. Furthermore, the material is available locally, so there are virtually no transportation costs. And, once the burn characteristics of the briquettes are understood, they burn very similarly to charcoal. If introduced to the marketplace properly, the presence of biomass briquettes should dramatically reduce the consumption of illegal forest charcoal. That’s good for mountain gorillas and people alike”. Robert Williams from Ending Charcoal

Indeed as I write the briquettes are on sale at half the price of charcoal and are selling well. It has been calculated that with 100 presses at work at once, the dependence of the town of Goma on charcoal will be ended (though they do have to find alot of trash for it)! The technology is available elsewhere but I’ve yet to see it put to use so successfully for such an important social and environmental cause.

Simon owns and runs CraftSkills, a small business based in Nairobi, Kenya that focuses on designing and building self-sustaining renewable energy projects in places not accessible to the electric grid. Craftskills had to date undertaken challenging projects in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Cameroon and Rwanda among other places. Simon, whom AfriGadget first got to meet last summer at TED Global in Arusha, Tanzania, graciously agreed to conduct an email interview with AfriGadget.

AfriGadget: Could you tell us when and how Craft Skills got into the business of renewable energy in East Africa and the inspiration behind the organization?

Simon: CRAFTSKILLS was found in the year 2000 by myself. I was inspired by a challenge from my rural home where we have not had power for the last 40 plus years since [Kenya's] independence [in 1963]. I come from a hill side village in Sagalla, Taita Hills in Coast Province where we receive quite some strong wind from the Nyika Plateau. This wind passes through without being tapped and sometimes our roofs can not stand in its way.

I started talking to people about wind turbines and how I can get an affordable one which I can make and produce for other needy people. When darkness falls in these villages plus the fog it is virtually impossible to travel the terrain at night.

AfriGadget: Tell us a little about the people behind Craft Skills and the staff who work for the organization.

Simon: I started with two workers. I could not afford to hire trained people so I decided to train myself first then train my two boys. Then I got a friend who repairs radios and TVs in Kibera to help me design and put together a charge controller.

Now we have a team of 20 people and other partners out there in the field with their staff totaling 50. We have technicians, welders fitters, fiberglass experts and engineers and sales people.

AfriGadget: What is the typical profile of a Craft Skills project? Who is your typical client and how are the projects typically executed?

Simon: Most of our clients are not the owners of the projects we put up. They benefit from the battery charging services in the wind/solar sites we put up with our partners. The low income earners who cannot afford grid power or are in settlements where grid power is unavailable. We take both to do the sites ourselves involving the people on the ground as partners. Others are home owners who have invested a lot on building good homes in non grid areas – these put up turbines for their own use like lighting, and pumping water from wells and boreholes. The other segment is the business people I market areas where there is no grid who put up turbines to run charging centres and sell power to other shops or run their off-grid businesses like lodges and hotels, schools and other institutions.

AfriGadget: Can you share with our readers some of the challenges that Craft Skills faces in executing your projects?

Simon: We have faced cultural challenges where we cannot put a turbine on the most ideal site due to beliefs on such sites hence we have to educate the citizens to allow us to do so or redesign the project and relocate. Another is the financial capability of the citizens we find in these off grid areas.

[As a result of this] we have designed low power product (battery bundles and LED lights) to reach them so that they can be counted as beneficiaries of this new technology.

AfriGadget: Why renewable energy? What is the rationale behind Craft Skills’ exclusive focus on projects that produce energy from renewable sources.

Simon: We were looking for something which is affordable and sustainable and cuts across the economic sectors. Solar was proving to be more expensive, delicate, sophisticated and easily stolen when installed on ones home. We needed to sell people more power at a cheaper rate hence wind was the best candidate.

Wind is everywhere just like solar – one needs to get the right spot to put the turbine as high as they can. Its 24 hrs (Day and Night) and we found a cheap way we could make our turbines take advantage of low wind situations with the multi-pole generator, hollow blades for the propeller, with 90 per cent locally available materials making our technology the best application for this region.

AfriGadget: Which would you say has been the most satisfying/gratifying project that you have been involved with at Craft Skills? What was so special to you about this particular project?

Simon: The Chifiri water pan project to me is most gratifying. This settlement is all arid land pastoral community. The demand for water for drinking washing and watering the thousands of livestock is enormous.

Our turbine provided a cheaper solution for water and lighting the “manyattas” around the water pan. The contractor on the ground is excellent on his construction of the earth dams. His design impressed me that water was going to be available for over 6 months instead of the normal 4 months after the rainy seasons. He made sure the dams were well compacted and fenced to avoid animals hoofing inside the dam – increasing the rate of percolation and lose of water in the ground. Water is only available at the kiosks which are piped and placed near the settlements. The project provides water troughs for the animals to drink from and bathrooms for the people to clean themselves in. Within the fenced dam there is an armed home guard or caretaker manning the place with a security light up the tower hoisting the turbine.

Simon was also interviewed by Juliana Chebet aka AfroMusing, a Senior Editor at AfriGadget on CraftSkills. You can find the video at this link.

One such idea was to create a fuel replacement for their pickup by using local palm nuts, a by-product of the palm kernels, which are generally fed to pigs or used for fertilizer. Since diesel fuel for their truck runs approximately $5/gallon, it wouldn’t hurt to try.

It became clear that in our poor country the chief hurdles were getting the chemicals and the right equipment. The search was on for the chemicals and after quite a treasure hunt and more than a few bribes we managed to find 4 litres of Methanol and 5 kilos of Potassium Hydroxide (enough to make a good bomb I think)…

…Actually the whole scene was quite amusing. Here we were hoping to compete with the big oil producers in the back yard of a small village and using an untried collection of old car parts, old pipes and taps attached to a used chemical container, all put together in an image downloaded from the internet. Nonetheless we were fuelled by much excitement, with much of the local community looking on, wondering what on earth we were up to.

Read the rest of this great story, and see a lot more images, on Paul in Sierra Leone’s Blog!

(hat tip Emeka)

“The current need for electricity in sub-Saharan Africa is staggering. Without power development is extremely difficult. The potential for this product is huge and the design could be of benefit to numerous communities in Africa and beyond.”

The idea came about after travels to East Africa, where he taught at a school and was inspired by the students. Daniel developed the see-saw power design as part of his final year at Coventry University. He has calculated that five to 10 minutes use on the see-saw could generate enough electricity to light a classroom for an evening.

Some Thoughts
What would be more interesting would be to see this idea built out with local supplies, as Daniel is going to be doing soon in Uganda. Then, with the knowledge learned there, see if it could fall into the same model of micro-entrepreneurial devices that we see with the KickStart water pumps. Speaking of which, this also reminds me of the PlayPumps idea, which also has a lot of potential.

Daniel states, “The unique selling point of this product is that it is not intended as a profit-making design.” I can only hope that he means this as profit for him. Profit making on the ground by Africans of this type of design could be crucial for its long-term success.

Via ApproVideo

Photo courtesy of Bergey. Oct 26 2006 Dedication of the cell phone base station site in Laisamis, Kenya Africa.

AfriGadget appears to be on a roll with wind power, so lets continue the wave shall we?

The company WinAfrique designs and builds hybrid wind and diesel turbine systems for powering cell phone base stations. Kenya’s biggest wireless companies Safaricom and Celtel have contracted with WinAfrique.

…Safaricom contracted with Winafrique Technologies in Nairobi to design and supply pilot wind/diesel hybrid systems at three very remote base stations. The systems consisted of a Bergey 7.5 kW turbine on a 24 m (80 ft) SSV tower, sealed batteries, and an inverter. These sites were installed and monitored for one year. The results showed excellent reliability and diesel fuel savings of 70-95%. Based on these positive results, Safaricom has contracted for six more sites, and has many other wind/diesel sites in the planning stage.

Hybrid systems that utilize renewable energy such as wind and solar are making it possible to extend wireless service in remote areas that are not connected to grid power. You can read more about Safaricom’s use of wind powered cell phone base stations, and more here about Celtel’s.

My last post was on ‘electranets’; the idea of generating electricity using a bottom up model where there are mini grids tied to the main grid. While catching up on my rss feeds, i found a very interesting webcast at the sustainable energy blog about Distributed Generation, which is somewhat along the lines of the ‘electranet’ post.

It is 18minutes long but well worth your time if you are interested. It is focused on the EU market but gives an excellent overview of the distributed generation and renewable energy sources. Click on the graphic below for the webcast by Rob Van Gerwen of KEMA.

On TED global Arusha, here are some links and blurbs from around the web.

Emeka Okafor of Timbuktu Chronicles

The ideas,initiatives,businesses,inventions,creative pursuits on display at TED Global provided us with hint of what exists and a glimpse of what is possible. We have barely skimmed the surface of ingenious and profound possibilities, I am gladdened and delighted that a face of the continent that hitherto remained unknown has made its debut.

Bruno Giussiani of Lunch over IP has a summary in 25 pills.

What appears clearly however is that Africa is at a turning point; a new and modern Africa is emerging as Africans create their own businesses, markets, media, and technology, and TEDGLOBAL could interpret, and maybe — that’s what many bloggers have written — boost this change.

Sean Barlow of Afropop on the music at TED global

Thankfully, TED made a significant commitment to live music for the conference. Mali’s Rokia Traore delivered a beautiful set. South African singer-writer Vusi Mahlasela (recently inducted into the Afropop Hall of Fame) had TEDsters almost crying with his songs of strength and resistance in the bad old days of apartheid.

Andrew Heavens of Meskelsquare

…Spend too long with the hippos at the UN and the AU and you could easily give up hope for the future of African technology. Spend some time with the cheetahs in Arusha and you begin to wonder whether there is actually something behind all this talk about an African Renaissance.

Sean Park -of Park Paradigm

Last week something special happened in Tanzania. A moment in time. A jumping off point. (Say it softly…) a new future for Africa.

Russell Southwood of balancing act africa interviews Salim amin

African 24 hour TV news channel project to start investor fundraising

For more - Technorati tag TED Global 2007 search

Pictures - TED Global 2007 flickr tag