It doesn't all go right

As the title goes, we don't always get things right.  Be it failing to recognize bad leadership in a community, installing faulty and broken equipment, or incorrectly sizing a solar installation, sometimes we just make mistakes.  This is especially true in the developing world where we often lack the resources, time and, most importantly in my case, expertise to get it right....right away.  But in the end it's ok, as always and everywhere we learn from our mistakes and hopefully share a laugh or two as well (so long as they aren't TOO serious).  And also, here the people's patience is infinite, being they have a lot of time and not a lot of people offering to help.  So in the end everything seems to work out, the water arrives, the lights turn on, the stoves work and most importantly, the smiles appear.

I bring up the topic of mistakes because I recently made my first notable mistake to date, and while being "explosive," nobody got hurt and we all got a little chuckle.  My mistake involves a wind turbine that I've been working on for Asofenix.  The design is based on simplicity and cost.  Using a $35 generator, a 6 meter tower and PVC blades we hoped to provide enough power to charge 1 or 2 batteries in a reasonable amount of time (1 day).  

The problem started with a lack of resources, in this case that we didn't have the money to do a wind study on the site we selected, instead we just climbed the hill and said "yup, there's wind."  Well there was DEFINITELY wind.  The problem actually started with the worries about the structural rigidity of the PVC blades and whether they would bend or not in the strong wind gusts, thus potentially striking the tower.  For this reason we moved the tower farther away from the hub and spinning blades of the generator.  We did this by adding weight (a big rock actually) to the back of the horizontal square metal tube resting on top of the tower upon which the generator was mounted.  The weight in the back shifted the center of mass of the system backwards, allowing us to move the tower back as well, far away from the blades.  What I didn't consider, because I never saw this failure mechanism, is that moving the tower back along the square tubing, away from the generator, increased the bending moment due to the weight of the generator AND the force of the wind on the blades.  

Remember how earlier I stated that there DEFINITELY was wind

?  Well there was a lot more than I had expected, and when we raised the tower the blades were spinning much fasting that I had expected, increasing drastically the force on the horizontal tube.  To make a long story short the metal tube actually bent in the force ofthe wind until the blades made contact with the tower, shattering into thousand of PVC shards.  The lesson learned....use a stronger tube, smaller blades and less space between the tower and generator.  We'll be applying these lessons this weekend in the second attempt to install our first wind turbine......wish us luck :)

In other news, I recently gave my first presentation / workshop in spanish to a group of campesinos, about the basics of electricity and how to install a home solar panel system.  About halfway through the 30 minute talk I forgot how to conjugate verbs, but I think they understood because 2 days later we supervised as they successfully installed their first system, saving themselves hundreds in hiring professional installers.  Now we feel confident in allowing them to install the rest of the 20 houses left in the community with panels bought through a grant given to Asofenix.

Finally, we're leaving in 3 hours or so to finish the installation of the water pumping system in Sonzapote, finally connecting each house up to the 5000 gallon tank which will gravity feed water throughout the community.

Now We Can Breathe

Dicember has been a busy month and for that I haven't been able to write very often (or at least haven't felt like making the time).  Now, while sitting in the airport with nothing to do I finally feel posessed to scribble a little.  Unfortunately, thinking back on all that we've done I'm becoming a bit overwhelmed as too how to go about it.  I guess I'll just start where I left off last time and see how far I get.

Hmmm....where did I leave off last time.  If I remember correctly we were getting ready for the arrival of Michel, GreenEmpowerment's solar engineer, and the quickly approaching installation of the Sonzapote solar water pumping project.  Overall the project was a great success and an AWSOME learning opportunity for me.  There's a huge difference between planning/designing and actually installing and the hands on experience was invaluable.  I'm now really anticipating Asofenix's next solar water project now that I have this one under my belt.

The work really started 3 days before heading to Sonzapote, when Michel arrived in Managua.  I had been communicating with Michel pretty regularly regarding the project details but it turns out that we were missing a truckload of supplies, ranging from high pressure PVC tubes to valves and elbows to safety rope and even nuts and bolts.  A look at the picture below shows the notes Michel and I worked off of as we looked for parts.  We managed to get everything prepared and ready, even with the horrible supply chain issues that are always present in Nicaragua, however Michel brought up a good point in that it seems to him that everytime he comes down to help with an installation Jaime relies on him more and more to plan and purchase last minute things.  This seems troubling as a major goal of Green Empowerment is to make the NGO's we work with, such as Asofenix, just as sustainable and self-sufficient as the projects they install.  We talked a lot about why this is backslide is occuring but no solid conclusions were reached.  One hope is that the presence of long term Asofenix volunteers (i.e. myself, seth and sarah) might help by supplying a consistent presence and experience base for future projects.  Who know if we're right, I hope so but only time will tell.

The actual instalation in Sonzapote went suprisingly well.  in two and a half days we were able to construct the solar array, controller, pump, tanks and piping.  All that is left now is to bring the piping to people's homes and connect the meters.  It was a great experience being able to work hand in hand with the communities.  Nicaraguans aren't always the most gracious people (you rarely hear a "gracias" while working in the campo) but nonetheless it was clear to see the excitement and appreciation in their smiles when the first buckets of water started to come out of the the well.  A special thank you to Michel from Green Empowerment who was vital to our efforts as well as a patient and knowledgable teacher.  Who knows, maybe some day soon his wish will come true and he won't be needed down here anymore....although that doesn't sound like good long term employement planning to me.

After the Sonzapote installation we dove straight into a month of week or 10 day long volunteer trips hosted by Green Empowerment and Asofenix, in which student groups from various universities arrived for planned excursions and projects (biodigestor, improved cookstove, wind turbine, irrigation, etc...) in the communities where Asofenix is involved (bramadero, el corozo, malacatoya, etc...).  I will admit that I'm not the biggest fan of these groups as I see them as a bit of distraction, not as much for Asofenix as for myself, as well as very intensive in terms of the amount of energy and planning needed, distracting me from the many other things which I want to focus my attention (biodigestor plans, micro hydro development, etc).  This is only my personal opinion and is very different from the Asofenix's stance.  Jaime really enjoys the groups and sees them as a great resource for us now and in the futre.  They definitely are a source of money for Asofenix and a really effective way to raise awareness and partnerships back in the US.  We already have several volunteers who want to stay in touch and help out from home....to these special people, we are currently looking for old, used laptops to install in communities that we have recently provided with electricity.  If you have one that you don't know what to do with just let me know.  

I think the problem for me is that I'm not a natural organizer and at times I felt as though I had a million things coming at me at once and all the while I had in the back of my mind whether people were enjoying themselves.  The bottom line is that it wasn't what I envisioned myself doing for a month of my time here and while it's something that in the big picture helps everybody in different ways (Green Empowerment, Asofenix and the groups), it wasn't something that I personally took to very well.

Getting that off my chest I can admit that there were some parts that I liked.  The people were overall very nice and well intentioned, and again it is a win win win situation when you look at the BIG BIG picture (unfortunately I'm only a small part of that).  

So now that the last members of the groups are finally trickling out of the office we have a little time to breath and reorganize ourselves.  The rest of the month includes finishing the small wind turbine installation in Sonzapote, diagnosing the Protreritos water pumping failure, finish installing the burner and pressure release mechanism in the Bramadero biodigestor, finishing the irrigation system in Bramadero and training the 6 community technicians who will complete the installation of the remaining 21 solar panels for El Corozo.  I also think we have to do some more planning on the microhydro but that's only in the back of my head right now.

I think that pretty much got us up to speed.   Sorry it took so long to get this out and I'll try to be more regular with my upcoming posts.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!!

Check out my pictures at www.greengringo.shutterfly.com for photos of the Sonzapote installation and more.