Miguel: August 2009 Archives

Our team in Zambia are hoping to meet soon with an organisation called Zambia Open Community Schools. They work with rural schools across Zambia and we hope that there could be a good potential partnership with SolarAid in the future.

Product testing
A product will be arriving in country soon for thorough testing amongst our micro-franchisees. This is a new product with multi-functional capabilities. It will be able to charge mobile phones, power LED lights and potentially a radio. The testing will take place over a 12 week period. Our franchisees participating in the testing process will keep a log of how they used the products, the benefits, disadvantages, faults and usability. At the end of assessment, our franchisees will complete a questionnaire which will give them an opportunity to express their views and decide if the product is viable and ready for the market.

Reaching remote areas with solar on wheels
The Zambia team hopes to experiment with macro-solar in a number of ways in the near future. One avenue being explored is the use of smaller panels used on portable charging and power providers.

The picture above shows the 'Solar Roller' developed by Firefly Solar and SolarAid together. This product was designed for UK events to offer solar-powered phone charging to members of the public as part of a fund and awareness-raising exercise. There is hope to further develop this product for use in Zambia and beyond, as a means of bringing power to very rural areas. Watch this space!