My colleague Sam Duby recently posted a challenge to some students at Nairobi University who were taking part in the Nasa Spaceapps Challenge. 

We asked them to build a monitoring tool for our access:energy wind turbines. In just 24 hours, they built the Bit Harvester, an sms-based remote data acquisition and control system for remote renewable energy installations.

And it’s just been voted the People’s Choice winner of the International Nasa Space Apps Challenge! Congratulations to all the team for their brilliant design work! Really impressive open hardware.

Having strapped two wind turbines to the roof and a solar panel inside our yellow Pajero named Beryl, we took to the road bound for Mfungano Island. We drove from Kisumu to Luanda K’Otieno where we took the car ferry to Mbita. From there, we loaded all the equipment onto a small wooden passenger boat.

Mfungano is a wildlife rich island on Lake Victoria with a population of around 30,000. Early settlers came to the Island from Uganda, escaping accusation of an attempt to assassinate the King. We were there to install two wind turbines and a solar panel on top of the mountain, Soklo. This will provide power for the new Ekielo Kiona community radio station and a high-speed line-of-sight internet link from Kisumu. 

The youth-driven radio station will broadcast in Suba and Luo language, and facilitate community-driven programs aimed at raising health and nutrition awareness, mobilising youth activism, improving social solidarity, promoting sustainable agriculture and fishing innovation, and preserve the endangered Suba language and cultural identity. This project is part of Organic Health Response’s fantastic work on the Island. 

The Island has just one road around its circumference. So we had to carry all our tools, the turbines, the solar panel and batteries all the way up the mountain - it was back breaking! But the beautiful views made up for it, and it was great to get down to work with lots of help from the local community, including Mr Ekelo, the local Mze who generously donated the land for the tower and turbines.

To find out more about this work, visit accessenergy.org

Photo taken this afternoon. On the final countdown of a fundraising campaign on IndieGoGo! Almost at $25,000. Join the crowd of supporters to help make energy access happen for communities across Kenya.

In the video is fellow permaculture student, Victor Monroy from the L’Esperance Orphanage in Rwanda.

Do we live on sunlight or do we live on fossilised sunlight? 

The more I learn about renewable energy, the more I realise it’s not that complicated. I feel I’ve spent far too long getting lost in the politics and economics of it in the UK while sitting on my hands doing nothing. In the UK, the challenge is not technical, it’s more societal, political and navigating the mazes of legislation. 

Today, on the permaculture course, the content was familiar. In the morning we talked about energy - the concepts, the types, the current situation, and how it links with permaculture. This was facilitated by my colleague Sam. It was interesting to get reactions from people about our project (access:energy) and to take a different perspective on what we are doing.

In the afternoon we made rocket stoves. These are relatively easy to build. All you need is some clay, dirt, water and a banana stem. There’s a guide on the access:energy website right here if you’re interested. And photos from the session are here on Facebook.

Please support and share access:energy’s campaign to train Kenyans to build more wind turbines. This is exciting. Check out the campaign here: www.indiegogo.com/accessenergy

A short video I put together yesterday in the workshop. We are testing a wind turbine made exclusively from readily available components that can be found across East Africa, as explained by my colleague Allan from access:energy.