By Kefa Senoga
In one week, the Uganda Christian University (UCU) kitchen uses 10 tons of firewood, which cost sh1.5million (about $400). In a year, Ekadu Richard, the head of Royal Hospitality, the company that offers catering services at the UCU Dining Hall, says the university spends a minimum of sh63million (about $16,700) on firewood.
Two decades ago, the university was spending less than 10 times this amount on the same amount of firewood. To put an end to the high expenditure, there has been a meeting the minds between the faculty and students of UCU and those of the Dartmouth College in the USA state of New Hampshire.
The two parties are experimenting using solar energy as a substitute for charcoal and wood in kitchens of institutions in Uganda. And the first beneficiary of this experiment is the UCU kitchen.
Three Dartmouth students – Noah Daniel, Ethan Aulwes and Veronica Yoravinsky – with their team leader, Stephen Doig, were in Uganda June 20 through July 10 to kickstart a partnership that is intended to reduce the number of trees cut for fuel and the amount of smoke generated from the university’s kitchen.
Should the innovation succeed, the long-term goal is to roll it out to as many institutions as possible. Statistics indicate that in the last 30 years, the forest cover in Uganda has been reduced from 24% to only 12%. If there is no intervention to the current rate of destruction of forest, trees could be wiped away by 2050.
Doig, the Senior Research and Strategy Advisor for Dartmouth’s Irving Institute and an expert in mini-grid development and energy efficiency, is uniquely equipped to advise students by taking ideas of theory and applying them to solve such real-world challenges. He has worked in different countries in Africa, such as Nigeria, Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Rwanda over the course of the last four years in the fields of mini-grid development and energy efficiency.
The final prototype design for the project is being developed by the Dartmouth engineering team, with substantial and helpful input from the team of UCU engineering students.
Daniel Tumusiime and Paul Ikocha, who are UCU engineering students, say that the project has provided them with a superior learning experience in terms of practical application of decision making and analytical skills, as well as team work and problem solving.
“This is an exciting experience,” Tumusiime said, “As engineering students, there’s nothing as exciting as seeing something we’ve done on paper coming into real life.”
Richard Ranger, an American who introduced this idea to UCU, said the project seeks to construct a solar thermal system that is able to preheat water up to 700C (158 degrees Fahrenheit) as it passes through tubes before it gets to the kitchen, to reduce on the amount of firewood used for heating it. Ranger joined UCU with his wife, Catherine, a year ago, as affiliates of the Society of Anglican Missionaries and Senders (SAMS) and has been lecturing law and business while also mentoring students at the university.
In a UCU podcast focused on understanding the technological innovation, Ranger said that the project involves the testing of a photovoltaic system, which has solar panels and an inverter that use the energy produced by the sun to generate electricity. That electricity then heats the coil sitting in the water tank, which in turn heats the water before it is drawn from the kitchen taps.
The exact option for heating water at UCU is one question the teams from Dartmouth and UCU will be finding out after setting up the project.
Firewood is the primary source of heat for cooking meals for the university community. Of the 10 firewood cookers in the kitchen, six are reserved primarily for heating water, which is used for cooking and washing utensils in the kitchen.
“This innovation is long overdue,” Ekadu said. “We needed it like yesterday, but we are still happy that it is here now. Sometimes, we run out of hot water while washing cutlery, and we need a lot of hot water to wash dishes, especially after a meal with beef.”
Vincent Kisenyi, the Dean of the School of Business at UCU, says once there is a good working relationship established, confidence between the two parties will be built to take the project forward.
“Many plans, such as UCU students going to the USA to look at interventions at Dartmouth will be explored at some point,” Kisenyi says.
He explained that through the partnership, UCU staff members will be exposed to how to guide their students in engaging in such practical projects. He said such partnerships open up opportunities for further research and collaboration and that they also help to market the university.
Rodgers Tayebwa, the head of the Department of Engineering and Environment in the Faculty of Engineering, Design and Technology at UCU, says that the project falls within UCU engineering department’s strategic plan.
“As a department, we are looking at enhancing the capacity of students and staff, and also looking at practical solutions to the existing challenge, especially starting with our campus here at UCU,” Tayebwa explained. “In most of the work we do, we involve students because the idea is to skill them through practical hands-on experience, so that’s why we selected those few students and are doing a course unit in renewable energy.”
Tayebwa emphasized the danger of firewood overuse to the kitchen staff, noting that renewable energy could be the magic bullet for safety and saving money.
