Solar Roots
Renewable Energy for Community Development
Solar Roots is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization registered in California, USA.
Our goal is to install and teach about Renewable Energy systems that empower people in developing countries to maintain a more sustainable lifestyle. The world is at critical point right now, facing many challenges: Peak Oil, Climate Change, Population Growth, Resource Scarcity and Pollution. Solar Roots offers renewable energy technologies to lower our carbon footprint and bring us back into a more balanced relationship with the natural environment, upon which we depend.
DONATE NOW!!
If you like the work that we do and would like to support it, please donate at this site:
http://www.globalgiving.org/dy/v2/content/search.html?q=solar+roots
If you like the work that we do and would like to support it, please donate at this site:
http://www.globalgiving.org/dy/v2/content/search.html?q=solar+roots
LATEST!
May 2013
It's the end of May and I'm working on remote clinics in Madagascar. Many of these clinics had solar PV systems installed 5 or 10 years ago but the batteries are now dead and the systems have stopped working. I have repaired four so far and have at least four more to go, before I leave for Tanzania on June 1st. Wish me luck!
May 2013
It's the end of May and I'm working on remote clinics in Madagascar. Many of these clinics had solar PV systems installed 5 or 10 years ago but the batteries are now dead and the systems have stopped working. I have repaired four so far and have at least four more to go, before I leave for Tanzania on June 1st. Wish me luck!
Some of the places where Solar Roots works:
1) Pyin Oo Lwin, Burma
2) Fianarantsoa, Madagascar
3) Ile de la Tortue, Haiti
Slideshow on our trainings for stove building, pot skirts and hayboxes
NEW STOVE VIDEO
Check out the new Down Feed Rocket stove in action. The video below shows how just 4 small sticks can generate lots of heat. The downfeed adapter increases air velocity and reduces the amount of time needed to tend the fire. This stove can be easily built by local villagers for about $3.
Latest Blog Entry: Spring 2013
Burmese Times #5
If you would like to support my work, please send a check, made out to "Solar Roots", to Solar Roots, PO Box 2838, Berkeley, CA 94702.
All donations are tax deductible in the US, to the full extent permitted by law.
(501(c)(3) #37-1618472)
All donations are tax deductible in the US, to the full extent permitted by law.
(501(c)(3) #37-1618472)
Ile de la Tortue, Haiti
Antoine calls us home with a blast on the traditional conch shell. The island of La Tortue, (Latoti in creole), off the north coast of Haiti, is home to around 63,000 people. It has traditionally been on the margins of Haitian society, once a haven for pirates, once a forgotten backwater under Duvalier. After a brief career as a smuggling hub, it is now languishing with little economic activity and few services. Previously it was known as the "green island", due to it's lush forests, but now, charcoal from the few remaining trees is one of the island's main exports. Antoine founded the Bello-Idovia Foundation to address some of the most difficult social and environmental problems, such as access to potable water, health and education. I have visited Latoti twice to support Antoine and his group, and plan to revisit in November 2013.
Antoine calls us home with a blast on the traditional conch shell. The island of La Tortue, (Latoti in creole), off the north coast of Haiti, is home to around 63,000 people. It has traditionally been on the margins of Haitian society, once a haven for pirates, once a forgotten backwater under Duvalier. After a brief career as a smuggling hub, it is now languishing with little economic activity and few services. Previously it was known as the "green island", due to it's lush forests, but now, charcoal from the few remaining trees is one of the island's main exports. Antoine founded the Bello-Idovia Foundation to address some of the most difficult social and environmental problems, such as access to potable water, health and education. I have visited Latoti twice to support Antoine and his group, and plan to revisit in November 2013.
Take a bumpy trip with us through the Madagascar countryside. In a 16- seater with about 25 people aboard, we see bullock carts, tall traditional houses and eucalyptus groves.
The new PV array on the Maison de Vannerie at Ambohimahamasina. The two story building is a combination of workshop, office and retail space for the women weavers with tourist accomodation above, from which the women's cooperative also benefits. Now they are all amped-up for a bright future!
Rocket Stoves
This is one of the rocket stoves I built in Sangklaburi, Thailand being introduced to a new user in Children of the Forest.
I built the stoves out of used drums with rocket elbows welded from square tube mild steel. This stove will consume at least 25% less wood to do the same cooking task. Note the metal skirt around the pot, which gives another 25% fuel efficiency.
This is one of the rocket stoves I built in Sangklaburi, Thailand being introduced to a new user in Children of the Forest.
I built the stoves out of used drums with rocket elbows welded from square tube mild steel. This stove will consume at least 25% less wood to do the same cooking task. Note the metal skirt around the pot, which gives another 25% fuel efficiency.
For details on the work done in the last five years, please go to the Blog Page
Solar Training
Here we are demonstrating the characteristics of solar cells and becoming familiar with multimeter testers. Students are learning that shade is the enemy of photovoltaics and that panels must be in full sun for optimal production. Having hands-on experience is critical to properly understanding this technology and retaining the knowledge. Here we see the new high technology of photovoltaics meeting the age-old technology of writing on one's hand!
Here we are demonstrating the characteristics of solar cells and becoming familiar with multimeter testers. Students are learning that shade is the enemy of photovoltaics and that panels must be in full sun for optimal production. Having hands-on experience is critical to properly understanding this technology and retaining the knowledge. Here we see the new high technology of photovoltaics meeting the age-old technology of writing on one's hand!
Current Location and Activity
Proposed Schedule for 2013
Jan - Apr - Myanmar - Solar and stove trainings
May - Madagascar - Solar PV installation and maintenance trainings
June - Tanzania - Solar cooking and PV trainings
July - Back in California for a well-earned rest!
July 22nd -26th - Stove Camp at Aprovecho Research Center, Oregon
November - Ile de la Tortue, Haiti - Stove workshop and PV installation
Proposed Schedule for 2013
Jan - Apr - Myanmar - Solar and stove trainings
May - Madagascar - Solar PV installation and maintenance trainings
June - Tanzania - Solar cooking and PV trainings
July - Back in California for a well-earned rest!
July 22nd -26th - Stove Camp at Aprovecho Research Center, Oregon
November - Ile de la Tortue, Haiti - Stove workshop and PV installation
We had to deploy the solar array so the electricians could keeping drilling and wiring! The ladies are cooking over a traditional 3-stone open fire. I must come back and give an improved cook stove training.
(Ambohimahamasina Vannerie project, Madagascar.)
(Ambohimahamasina Vannerie project, Madagascar.)
RE: The two most important letters in the alphabet right now
REduce
REuse
REcycle
REdesign
and of course........ Renewable Energy!
REduce
REuse
REcycle
REdesign
and of course........ Renewable Energy!
Stoves
I became interested in cook stoves when I was in Madagascar in Spring 2010 and I saw families spending many hours in smoke-filled kitchens, cooking over open fires. I decided to dedicate the next 12 months to learning about improved cookstoves and to helping promote their use in developing countries. In Summer 2011 I studied at the Aprovecho Research Center in Cottage Grove, Oregon.http://www.aprovecho.org/lab/home. I learned a great deal during my two visits there, especially important was finding out what a complex subject the improved cook stove is. Not only are there many technical issues, but there is also the equally important matter of acceptance into the traditional cooking culture. You may have the best stove in the world, but if the cooks don't like it, it will sit in the corner gathering dust! This is one of the major problems with solar cookers - they are just too different from what the cooks are using right now and they break some of the patterns that are central to daily village life. I believe that solar cooking will be widely adopted in 30 to 50 years from now, but we will have a transition period where over 2 billion people will still depend on bio-mass sources for cooking. This is why improved wood and charcoal burning stoves are so important. Hopefully, during this transition period we can vastly increase the efficiency and usability of solar cookers and begin to reverse the deforestation that is destroying our natural heritage.
I became interested in cook stoves when I was in Madagascar in Spring 2010 and I saw families spending many hours in smoke-filled kitchens, cooking over open fires. I decided to dedicate the next 12 months to learning about improved cookstoves and to helping promote their use in developing countries. In Summer 2011 I studied at the Aprovecho Research Center in Cottage Grove, Oregon.http://www.aprovecho.org/lab/home. I learned a great deal during my two visits there, especially important was finding out what a complex subject the improved cook stove is. Not only are there many technical issues, but there is also the equally important matter of acceptance into the traditional cooking culture. You may have the best stove in the world, but if the cooks don't like it, it will sit in the corner gathering dust! This is one of the major problems with solar cookers - they are just too different from what the cooks are using right now and they break some of the patterns that are central to daily village life. I believe that solar cooking will be widely adopted in 30 to 50 years from now, but we will have a transition period where over 2 billion people will still depend on bio-mass sources for cooking. This is why improved wood and charcoal burning stoves are so important. Hopefully, during this transition period we can vastly increase the efficiency and usability of solar cookers and begin to reverse the deforestation that is destroying our natural heritage.
Pulling the new solar water heating tubes onto the roof at Naw Paw Lulu's old people's home in Huay Malai, Thailand.
In the bayous and backwaters of the Ayerwaddy Delta area, Myanmar.
Pot skirts
Here, a family of aluminum smelters is discussing how best to make the pot skirt I have just described to them. A metal skirt surrounding a pot forces the hot gases that are normally lost, to scrape against the sides of the pot, thereby giving heat transfer through the sides as well as the bottom of the pot. Up to 25% fuel savings can be realized by using a pot skirt and it works equally well on all stoves.
Here, a family of aluminum smelters is discussing how best to make the pot skirt I have just described to them. A metal skirt surrounding a pot forces the hot gases that are normally lost, to scrape against the sides of the pot, thereby giving heat transfer through the sides as well as the bottom of the pot. Up to 25% fuel savings can be realized by using a pot skirt and it works equally well on all stoves.
Round cassava is being made into flat bread. Delicious with peanut butter or honey, both also produced locally. (Island of La Tortue, Haiti)
Shy kids stand beside a grinding stone ("quern"), in the Plain of Jars, Laos.
