Harnessing the Sun: Transforming Vision into Reality: Part I

We did it!! With the help of our incredible supporters we exceeded our goal and raised over $700 US dollars - sufficient funds to cover all of the project's remaining costs! Many thanks to all those who contributed and allowed us to transform our vision into a reality.

On the steps of the finished solar dehydrator!

With funding secured, it was time to get things moving. Chaytanya and Brennan set out to finish construction on the large-scale solar dehydrator and solar oven. After several weeks of long hours in the hot sun the dehydrator and oven were ready!

Konojel can now boast one of the largest solar dehydrators I have ever seen! The dehydrator is built about 10 feet up into a rock wall with two long collectors that extend to the ground. These collectors, covered in plexiglass and insulated in black wire mesh, focus solar thermal heat to funnel a continuing stream of hot air through the dehydrator's drying racks. The dehydrator has 24 wire screen drying racks and at full capacity can dry over 60 pounds of fruit! We started experimenting with sun dried tomatoes, papaya, pineapple, strawberries, bananas, beets, and zucchini just to name a few.

Cooking delicious treats using the power of the sun!

Brennan's solar oven resembles a large conventional oven in size and capability. The oven's walls consist of two layers of plywood internally insulated with cardboard. Above the oven three large reflectors covered in aluminum mylar focus solar rays through the sealed glass top of the oven. Inside the oven is painted black to better retain heat. The oven is built on wheels and can be easily moved to follow the sun's path in the sky throughout the course of the day. The oven is large enough to fit four large cooking pans and can reach up to 300 degrees Fahrenheit!

The construction period was also an important opportunity to share knowledge and skills with the local community. To this end Brennan and Chaytanya partnered with Mauricio, Konojel's local carpenter. Mauricio proved invaluable. He helped in sourcing local materials and aided Brennan and Chaytanya with the construction at every step. As the weeks passed he gained firsthand knowledge in how to build and fix both technologies. His presence instills confidence that Konojel will be able to independently maintain and repair the solar oven and solar dehydrator.

Moreover, the Konojel team is passionate about sharing these skills with the wider community. After Project Nuevo Mundo led a workshop at Konojel on how to build fuel efficient rocket stoves, Mauricio held a follow-up workshop to teach these skills to the non-Spanish speaking Mayan indigenous community. Fluent in Spanish and the local Mayan dialect Mauricio and Maria, the Konojel manager, serve as an essential cultural bridge.  Mauricio plans to hold workshops at Konojel to teach the local community how to build solar ovens and solar

Mauricio helping to build the solar oven.

dehydrators for their homes. 

The Konojel team now hopes to to use the center as a sustainable technology demonstration site where they can bring school and community groups to learn about the solar dehydrator, solar oven, and the center's two existing rocket stoves.

Too often sustainable technology projects in the developing world fall apart because they fail to embrace the concepts of appropriate technology and community buy-in. Well meaning organizations bring high-tech, miracle technologies to underdeveloped areas in an effort to help improve standards of living. The projects run smoothly until a part breaks that cannot be easily replaced or the technology requires maintenance that no one in the community has the skills to perform. At that point such projects are often abandoned by the local community.

The concept of appropriate technology stresses the importance of building with materials accessible to the local population and ensuring local skill training. A core value guiding our work in this project was to create appropriate and replicable technologies. Keeping this in mind, Brennan and Chaytanya built the solar oven and solar dehydrator utilizing relatively simple designs and only materials they could source locally.

A touching moment of appreciation with the Konojel team

Finally, it was time to celebrate! After all of that hard work we needed to take a moment to appreciate the fruits of our labors (literally!).  We threw a party for the Konojel community. Chaytanya and Brennan presented and explained how the solar dehydrator and solar oven worked. I worked with the local women teaching them how to dehydrate pineapples and papayas.

 Brennan and Maria cooked delicious solar baked oatmeal raisin chocolate chip cookies in the oven. Local children ran around the platform of the dehydrator playing hide and seek while we fielded questions from their parents about how the technologies worked. The party also provided a touching moment when the Konojel team expressed their deep appreciation for our work there.

With the solar dehydrator and solar oven built, it was time to turn our attention to the final stage of the project. While Chaytanya and Brennan had been working on the solar dehydrator and solar oven, I had been developing the corresponding sustainable enterprise. I had spent the last few weeks prototyping, sourcing packaging, designing marketing materials, and working on a business plan. Now it was time to put that plan into action.

Support Our Amazing Project!

What's that? Delicious solar toasted granola and solar dehydrated fruit as a sustainable social enterprise supporting and empowering a malnourished community in Guatemala? Yep, to recap, that's our project. 

Chaytanya and Mateo building the dehydrator prototype

If January was a time for planning, community engagement, and sourcing of materials, February has been a month of action. Chaytanya and Brennan set to work building prototypes of the solar dehydrator and solar oven to make sure we had the best technological design. They built fully functioning mini-models and soon we were snacking on delicious dried pineapple and sun roasted nuts to fuel our brainstorming sessions.

Meanwhile, I set to work on a more in-depth market analysis to understand what kind of products we should make. How could we compete on cost, quality, and originality? With almost no dehydrated fruit on the market the opportunities were abundant. We decided to design a few different products and test how they sold: a delicious superfood fruit and nut bar, fruit leather, trail mix, and simple packages of dried fruit. Yum. 

Starting the final version of solar dehydrator! 

With the solar dehydrator and oven designs complete it was time to think big. Chaytanya and Brennan partnered with a carpenter workshop in the area and members of the local Mayan community to start building. The results thus far are impressive. The solar dehydrator uses the sun to create an airflow that dries fruit in one to two days. The solar oven concentrates solar thermal energy to cook food at the same temperatures as a conventional oven.

Ben and I began a period of mad scientist experimentation in the kitchen working with dried fruit and sun roasted granola from the prototype solar dehydrator and solar oven. Our best nutrition bar recipe thus far involves a dried banana base mixed in with sun roasted granola and chunks of cacao and then baked in our solar oven. It's tasty enough that one of our biggest challenges has been protecting it from prying hands in the kitchen long enough to taste test. We also began researching and sourcing packaging options as Brennan and I have worked on label design.

Mad scientist recipe concoctions in the kitchen. Yum.

In the next two weeks we plan to finish construction on the solar dehydrator and solar oven as well as hold workshops at Konojel with the local community on how to operate and maintain the technologies. We plan to finalize our recipes and teach them to the women who work at Konojel. Finally, we plan to complete the packaging and logo design and begin the marketing and small scale roll out of the product. But we need your help!

How You Can Help:

Our initial seed funding from Project Nuevo Mundo has gotten us far, but we need your help to finish the project! Our goal is raise $500 dollars USD in the next week. It's a tall order, but with the power of all our combined networks I know we can do it! Have only $10, $15, $20 to contribute? Awesome! Do you know how far that goes in Guatemala?

With your incredibly generous donations we will be able to pay off the final hardware costs on the solar dehydrator and oven, purchase a starting surplus of fruit and nuts to start off the sustainable enterprise, buy labels and packaging for the first month of production, buy food storage containers, and potentially a back-up blender, plus so much more!

We're talking about feeding malnourished children while empowering local indigenous women through a sustainable, revenue generating, social enterprise. Solar energy never felt so good!

Donations:

You can send your donations to us via PayPal. Please send all donations to "julianamandell@gmail.com" on PayPal. We will make sure to send everyone who contributes a confirmation that we recieved your donation.  Also, don't be confused if the name on the account at some point reads "Abigail Jones" as the account was orginally under my mother's name. However,  all donations go directly to my account. 

If you are unfamiliar with PayPal follow these simple steps: 1) Log into your PayPal Account.  2) Click on the "Send Money" tab.  3) Under "To:" enter "julianamandell@gmail.com" then the amount you want to contribute.  4) Select "USA" for our country of residence and "Sending money to family or friends." 5) Press Continue!  

 Please let us know if you have any problems.

THANK YOU!!!

Solar Sprouting: The Konojel Project

What if we could use the power of the sun to feed malnourished children in an ecologically and economically sustainable way? This was the idea that sparked the creation of the Konojel project. 

Lake Atitlan is an area rich in contradictions. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, the fertile earth swells with abundant fresh tropical fruits, coffee plants, and local superfoods,  yet the people here struggle to feed themselves. Tourists from wealthy nations all over the world come to appreciate the area's beauty and indigenous culture, yet these very populations remain in extreme poverty.  

The Konojel nutrition center serves over 60 free meals a day

Many of these travelers are unaware that malnutrition is a significant problem both around Lake Atitlan and throughout Guatemala. According to the United Nations statistics Guatemala has the 5th highest level of chronic malnutrition in the world. In San Marcos del Lago, a tiny indigenous town on Lake Atitlan, the Konojel Nutrition Center strives to combat malnutrition through education, local empowerment, and it's free lunch program. Founded over two years ago and named for the Mayan word "konojel" meaning "all together,"  the center currently serves over 60 free meals a day to malnourished children, pregnant women, and the elderly.

Speaking with Konojel's directors Andrew and Stephen we came to understand two key problems facing the center. First, the center struggled with how to produce the most nutritious food possible at the lowest cost. Second, the center was stuck in a fundraising cycle: dependent on donations to survive and chronically in danger of running out of funding. Listening to all this we had an idea.

We proposed to utilize one resource the Konojel center had in abundance: the sun. We would build a solar dehydrator and solar oven on the center property.  Using the solar dehydrator, fruits and vegetables could be dried in-season and consumed throughout the year. Ovens are a rarity in these parts - almost all cooking is done over inefficient wood stoves. These simple solar technologies offered a fuel-free way to cook, bake, and preserve food.

Brennan, Ben, and I cooking up some delicious solar granola!

The Konojel team was incredibly excited about our proposal, but we wanted to take it one step further. What if these technologies could also be used to generate a sustained revenue stream to support the center? Initial market research showed that no dried fruit products were for sale in the local or tourist markets. We proposed to aid Konojel in the design and development of a sustainable enterprise selling dried fruits, trail mix, and nutrition bars!  

With Konojel on board Brennan and I needed a dream team to make our vision come to life.  Our first recruit was Chaytanya Beriault, an incredibly talented and skilled carpenter who had grown up with a solar dehydrator and was enthusiastic about our plan. Next we brought Ben Dwyer on board.  Ben, who had joined up with Project Nuevo Mundo in December, boasted experience running sustainable non-profit enterprises in Thailand and is an excellent cook. With Chaytanya and Brennan to build the solar dehydrator and solar oven, and Ben and I to develop the sustainable enterprise, we had our dream team!

Finally, we needed funding. With Brennan and Ben a part of Nuevo Mundo a partnership sounded ideal. We pitched them our project proposal and they loved it! They offered us the seed capital we needed to get started and access to all of their resources they could offer. We were ready to start building!

Germination: Oaxaca, Chiapas, and Beyond

Oaxaca, Mexico had been whispering for me to visit long before I arrived. Día de los Muertos was on my lifetime bucket list, I loved the vibrant color and style of Mexican street and folk art, and it was hard to resist the opportunity to eat as much mole as humanly possible. It also had lots of sunshine.

Beyond just travel, a core intention of my trip was to learn more about how solar energy could assist and empower developing communities in Latin America. I was interested in off-grid solar power as an economically and ecologically sustainable solution for un-electrified and under-electrified communities.

My work the previous year at Sungevity, a residential solar company based out of Oakland, had planted this seed. Sungevity stoked my excitement for the transformative potential of solar energy. Here was a company enabling customers to power their homes with solar energy while simultaneously saving money, and all the while generating a profit. Talk about win-win-win. I was inspired. I wondered though, could this win-win-win model work in developing nations, in communities who need that win the most?

My initial research showed me that not only was it possible, but that the economic incentives and opportunities were even stronger. Un-electrified communities use kerosene, diesel, and candles all of which are more expensive than solar energy. With creative leasing and pay-as-you-go models organizations were removing the upfront costs to solar and enabling these communities to harness the power of the sun. Solar cookers, moreover, were already being deployed around the world as an amazing appropriate technology solution to areas where people cooked on inefficient and hazardous wood stoves (over 2.8 billion people worldwide!)

My time in Mexico was a time for for learning, exploring, the germination of ideas, and indeed lots of delicious mole. I contacted and visited like minded organizations to learn more about their work: solar cooking, bicycle powered blenders, off-grid solar power for indigenous communities in the mountains of Oaxaca. My Spanish skills dusted themselves off from the dark corners of my brain were they had slumbered since my college semester abroad in Spain and I could speak Spanish again! I met some of the kindest and warmest people I had ever met. I fell in love with Mexico. Eventually though, it was time to keep moving south and transform ideas into action.

I landed in Guatemala on December 28, just in time to celebrate New Years on Lake Atitlan with a few good friends from the home who also happened to be there. Lake Atitlan seems to spill out of the clouds like a dream. A highland lake that is actually the mouth of a giant volcano ringed by smaller volcanoes that are all attached. Small indigenous villages communities are spread across the lake and the best means of transportation is by boat. There I connected up with the non-profit Project Nuevo Mundo started by some friends of mine in the Bay Area. In particular with my friend Brennan Bird who has a wealth of experience in solar cooker technology and a similar passion for the potential of such technology down here. A collaboration was born and a project dreamed up.