William Kamkwamba, author, "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind," and Malawi Windmill Maker

Funds raised to date and use of proceeds

Due to your generosity, I have received many donations so far, which I shall apply to the projects that I am doing to improve the life of my family. The donations range from $1 and up and come from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. I plan to list the first names and last initials of donors and their cities in an upcoming post. I am very grateful to all of you who have contributed so far. With matching donations from the challenge grant, the numbers will climb.

Some of uses of proceeds included: mattresses, blankets and pillows for family members; anti-malarial bednets, mosquito coils, and anti-bug powder; sanitary drinking water dispenser and containers, pots and pans, and water disinfectant; medicine, such as children's Panadol, aspirin, and bandages; food staples such as cooking oil, salt, sugar, milk; shoes; hand and clothes soap, toothbrushes and toothpaste, toilet paper, towels, and sponges; school supplies including pens and composition notebooks; cups, plates and bowls; and safety equipment such as a fire extinguisher and lightning diverter (lightning rod in U.S. parlance.)

These funds will also pay for the enhanced lighting and power in my home as documented on the blog. I'm working on a project right now to benefit my extended family, many of whom live in the five home in my immediate neighborhood. I am eager to tell you about it, but want to wait until it is finished first.

When planting season comes, I will use some of the funds to buy seed, fertilizer and urea for my family's crops of maize, ground nuts and beans.

I have also opened a bank account and put funds in so that my family is now prepared for medical, food or other needs and/or emergencies.  I have started saving for the rest of private secondary school, boarding and university, too.

Some statistics about the blog

We starting blogging in earnest June 18, and now it's Sunday July 15, about one month later. So far the blog has received 113,047 page views, including 64,851 views on July 5, 2007 alone, the day the site hit BoingBoing.net, Digg, Reddit, and Metafilter. There were about 100 entries in the Google Index for my project on June 6, 2007, and now there are 69,000 to 75,000, depending on when you search. There are 131,000 entries in Yahoo, 5,589 in MSN and 715 in Ask.com. Technorati lists 231 posts and a rank of 65,238 and an Authority level of 87. Bloglines lists 517 posts.

School's out at Madisi Secondary School, and after a break, I start my new school, the ABCCA

In one week I will finish my second trimester of first form (freshman year of high school) at Madisi Secondary [Boarding] School in Madisi, Malawi, about one hour south from my home towards the capital city of Lilongwe. I am very grateful to all the teachers including the headmaster Mr. Banda. I've been back in school since April of this year, thanks to the Herculean efforts of Dr. Hartford Mchazime, Ph.D., my Malawian mentor and Deputy Head of Party of the Malawi Teacher Training Activity, a program of USAID. He contacted the Malawian Ministry of Education to secure me a spot despite my age (19) and took up a collection in his office to send me back to school. 

I have a month's vacation, and then on August 20th, I will start at my new school African Bible College Christian Academy, a Lilongwe secondary school/high school for the kids of Presbyterian Missionaries working in Africa. The secondary school's head teacher is Lorilee Maclean a native of Canada and an English teacher. The new headmaster Chuck Wilson arrives in a couple of weeks from Sacramento, California in the United States. He is a retired math and science teacher and school administer. Mr. Wilson and Mrs. Maclean will be responsible for my education at ABCCA. The high school grants an American High School Diploma through a distance learning program. I will also study to pass my Malawian Secondary School exams, the JCE and the MCE. Because my favorite sport is Volleyball, I'm happy they have a volleyball court. One thing I'm excited about is their brand-new swimming pool. I'm looking forward to taking swimming lessons, as I don't yet know how to swim.

Mrs. Maclean gave me several books to study before school begins, including an English Grammar textbook, a Geometry textbook and workbook, and several novels including The Red Badge of Courage (1895) by Stephen Crane. I'm reading it with The Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary close by, as I'm a bit out of practice with reading. I like having books of my own. In many schools in Malawi, there are not enough books for every child to have his or her own.

One of my mentors brought me books from the University of Nairobi bookstore in Kenya. Books include on Solar Energy: Fundamentals and Applications, Mechanical Engineering (Conventional and Objective Type), the aforementioned Oxford Dictionary and the McGraw Dictionary of Engineering, Irrigation Water Management: Principles and Practice, Mechanical Engineering Systems, Elements of Environmental Engineering, and Crop Management: An Introduction. It will be a while before I read all these books.

About Steve Sharra, remarkable Malawian

Steve Sharra, Ph.D. writes for Global Voices and his blog Afrika Aphukira

Steve Sharra wrote about me last week. He was also mentored by Dr. Hartford Mchazime, Ph.D. I spoke to him last week on the phone for the first time. He lives in Lansing Michigan in the United States. I hope to meet him in person one day.

From his Global Voices profile:
I am a Malawian who studies and writes about Pan-Afrikanism, Afrikan epistemology (uMunthu), the Afrikan Renaissance, and peace and social justice. I am also a student of autobiography, critical pedagogy, and critical literacy research. I am a former school teacher, freelance journalist, and educational editor. I write poetry, fiction, radio plays, and features. My blog, Afrika Aphukira (http://www.mlauzi.blogspot.com), is an optimistic expression of the theme of the African rebirth. I also follow Malawian blogs at Mlauzi' s Bloglines (http://www.bloglines.com/blog/mlauzi).

From a 2003 Compton Foundation Fellowship (He has subsequently completed his Ph.D.:

Department of Teacher Education (Malawi)
Michigan State University

I am a Malawian national currently studying for a PhD in Teacher Education at Michigan State University. I have been a primary school teacher, an editor of educational materials, a freelance newspaper and radio journalist, and a creative writer, in Malawi. Before becoming a teacher, I spent five years in two Catholic minor seminaries, where I had hoped to become a priest. I was asked to leave the seminary in 1988, aged 17.

In 1995 I won first prize in a writing contest with a children’s novel, based on adaptations of stories I was told by refugees who had fled a 16 year-old civil war in Mozambique, Malawi’s largest neighbor. The novel, Fleeing the War, was published by Macmillan and distributed to all government-run primary and secondary schools in Malawi. Prior to this, my colleagues and I formed a writers’ workshop during our four years in a teacher training program, and some of our poetry and fiction made its way into school textbooks, read by students across the country. I have published several poems, short stories and literary features in Malawian national newspapers. I have also had a play broadcast on national radio in Malawi, and a children’s story read on the British Broadcasting Corporation.

In 1995 I was elected treasurer of the Malawi Writers Union (MAWU), and a year later was elected its president. As president of MAWU, I chaired Malawi’s 1997 literary festival and book fair.

Article from the Sunday Daily Times July 8, 2007 by Steve Sharra

Steve Sharra, Ph.D. writes the amazing blog about Malawi called afrika-aphukira: "Midwiving the Afrikan rebirth. . . Views of Afrika and the world, on the path to the renaissance, from a social justice and an Afrikan epistemological perspective--uMunthu. Includes specific commentary on Malawi and Sub-Saharan Africa.

He wrote an extremely kind piece on me and my work on his blog and in Malawi's Sunday Daily Times last week:

Unleashing the Mind: William Kamkwamba, Malawian Genius, and the New Media
BY Steve Sharra, Ph.D. - The Sunday Times
08 July 2007

His is the most inspirational story I have read this year. In 2002, William Kamkwamba was unable to continue with his secondary school education, as his parents couldn’t afford the school fees. This was just after two terms in Form 1 (high school freshman), and he was 14 years old.

But his desire to keep reading and learning led him into a library at a nearby primary school in Kasungu, and to a book on how to make electricity. He went ahead and made a windmill just following the instructions in the book. The school library was donated as part of the Malawi Teacher Training Activity (MTTA), a Usaid teacher development project that started in September 2004, and has involved teachers in four districts in Malawi, namely Kasungu, Machinga, Mzimba South, and Phalombe. MTTA involves partners who include the American Institutes of Research (AIR), Miske Witt & Associates (MWAI), and the Malawi Institute of Education (MIE).

I show later in this posting that Kamkwamba's story holds an important lesson for Malawi and other countries about educational beliefs and practices, and their potential to either facilitate or kill emergent talent and creativity. In addition to William's story, I use two more examples to make the above point. I write about Andrews Nchessie, a primary school teacher also in Kasungu who is now a teacher educator, and whose own unique story shares similarly fascinating parallels with William. I also write about Nolence Mwangwego, a Malawian teacher of the French language who invented a writing script. I finish with two Malawian farmers who have made significant contributions to agricultural practices in Malawi by inventing new ways of irrigating farms: one is Friday Nikoloma of Thyolo, and the other is Dr. Chinkuntha of Dowa.

When the MTTA deputy chief of party, Dr. Hartford Mchazime heard of William's windmill and its origins in the library donated by MTTA, he went to visit William. He brought with him journalists, and a story that appeared in The Daily Times (20 November 2006) was picked up by bloggers including Soyapi Mumba () and Mike McKay (). Early last month, the programme director of the Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) annual conference, Emeka Okafor, himself a prominent blogger who saw William's story on the above Malawian blogs, invited Kamkwamba to attend and talk at TEDGlobal, one of the world's largest technology conferences, held this year June 4-7 in Arusha, Tanzania.

Kamkwamba's life has not been the same since. The 2007 TEDGlobal conference was also attended by the likes of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Larry Page (the guy who gave us Google), Phillipe Starck, Bono, and on previous occasions, Bill Clinton, and many other famous Who are Who’s in the world. About three weeks ago he touched a computer for the first time in his life, opened an email account, and two week ago he started his own blog. Comments and congratulations are coming in from around the world, and in the words of one of the organisers at TED, there is a "firestorm" of interest brewing for Kamkwamba.

Where do I live? Find out in Google Earth

Lots of people have asked, "where do you live exactly?" It's about 2 1/2 hours north of the capital city of Lilongwe in Malawi. You can fly there in Google Earth (free download). Here is the link to my village: Wimbe.

Where I live as seen in Google Earth.

A lot of people don't know where Malawi is in Africa. We're bordered on the north by Tanzania, where I traveled for TEDGlobal, on the West by Zambia and on the Southwest and East by Mozambique. Though Malawi is completely landlocked (no border on the Indian Ocean), we have a large freshwater lake running down the East side of the country. Despite Lake Malawi, water can be scarce in the villages. It's about an hour's drive from my village to the east to get to the Salima, a town on Lake Malawi where my maternal grandparents live.

Malawi Map courtesy Merriam-Webster

Malawi is in Southern Africa, North of Mozambique and South of Tanzania.

Surveying for water

One of my goals for some time has been to build a more powerful windmill to pump water to irrigate a vegetable garden for my family, and eventually our crops of maize, beans and ground nuts (Americans call them peanuts). Maize (corn) and ground nuts in combination provide the main source of protein for my family and the Malawian dish Nsima, made from maize, is our daily staple. My family has a well we dug in 1992 that we manually draw water from using a rope we made from plastic bags, with a empty can at the end that used to contain cooking oil donated by USAID during a famine last year. 

We will need a larger water source if we are to irrigate, and the last thing I want to do is to drill a well which dries up the ground water for others through overconsumption of limited supply. Alfred Maele of National Solar brought a water engineer to conduct a survey of my extended family's land to determine the feasibility of things like running water in our homes and drip irrigation.

The water surveyor explains to me and my family members how his machine works

The water engineer, me and Alfred Maele of National Solar

Here is the report. If any of you are water experts, I'd appreciate your feedback on the conclusions.

REPORT ON GEOPHYSICAL SURVEY RESULT CONDUCTED AT MASITALA VILLAGE T/A WIMBE IN KASUNGU DISTRICT ON 08th JULY, 2007

GEOLOGYSICAL METHODS USED:

The method used to identify the site is Electrical Resistivity (ER) and this is capable of picking some fracture zones and determines the quite thickness and the Sub-surface geology.  Constant standard transverse (CSTS) were conducted to check on the vertical variation of the quite under investigation.  Electrical Resistivity method is also directly related to groundwater occurrence by using two facts of prospecting.

Vertical Electrical Sounding (VES) whereby the distribution of the Electrical Resistivity with depth is studied by progressively increasing the depth of investigation.  These investigation (VES)are effective when the geoelectrical horizon are relatively flat lying or gently dipping.

Horizontal electrical profiling whereby the lateral distribution of electrical resistivity is studied by an electrode array for the depth of investigation remains effective when lateral charges are large.  It is through the analysis of VES data that groundwater potential and drilling depth is deduced using Schlumberger array.

The Hydro-geological condition is generally good with thin weathered basement rock but potential for groundwater exploitation is reliable.  Groundwater flow is generally North/West –East.  Water level is roughing from 8m-35m deep, yield of 1.5 litres per second can be obtained if properly developed and designed.

SITE RECOMMENDATION FOR DRILLING.

-          Drill up to 60 metres
-          Some grave mixed with boulders will be encountered in some depth between 13-25 metres
-          Rotary air rig is recommended.

First picture of the new alternator and metal blades

In two earlier posts, I talked about installing metal blades to replace the plastic ones, and replacing the bicycle dynamo with a more powerful treadmill motor. My cousin helped me with this project. Here is the first picture of the new setup:

The windmill with the new metal blades made from a metallic drum. The photo also shows  the new alternator running a smaller wheel so as to reduce the speed, in order to achieve the required voltage for the batteries.

A report emailed to one of my mentors from Alfred Maele of National Solar, who has been helping me on a few projects: "William has so replaced the alternator with the one [Baobab Health] supplied and we measured the current was 3 Amps which was satisfactory. [William and] we are still observing its capability to charge the batteries before combining with [the next phase of our project] and this would probably take another week before we conclude.  We have provided William with a digital multimeter to enable him take readings of voltage and current during this period.  Our conclusion after a week will decide whether it is indeed necessary to combine the system with [the next phase] or not."   I am very excited to tell you about the next phase of the project, but I wish to wait until it's completely finished and then I'll share it with you.

Article in La Reppublica, Italy, June 6, 2007

This article from La Reppublica appeared last Friday. If anyone could email me an English translation, I'd post that, too, along with thanks to you. Gratzie!

Malawi, ragazzo autocostruisce un impianto eolico-solare
di Tiziano Toniutti

William Kamkawamba, un giovane di 19 anni di Kasungu, ha costruito un generatore di energia per la sua comunità utilizzando materiali di fortuna. Il sistema funziona con l'energia del vento - e a breve del sole - e garantisce approvvigionamento elettrico per ora ad alcune costruzioni ed in futuro all'intero villaggio.

Installando la bicicletta di suo padre sulla cima del traliccio e agganciando a questa delle pale di plastica, l'apparecchio di Kamkawamba produce elettricità che viene poi convogliata alle abitazioni. Le future modifiche prevedono l'installazione di pannelli termici sulle pale e sul traliccio, per catturare anche l'energia solare.

Il blog di Kamkawamba è raggiungibile a questo indirizzo e c'è la possibilità di contribuire alla sua formazione scientifica.

Thanks to Silvia for providing this translation. Please email me or comment if you have refinements:

"Malawi, youth builds a wind-solar system by himself
by Tiziano Toniutti

William Kamkawamba, a 19 year-old youth  from Kasungu, has constructed an electric generator for his community using makeshift materials. The system works with wind power  - and soon solar power - and guarantees/enables electricity to a few buildings now, and in the future to the entire village.

Built by first attaching plastic paddles to his father's bicycle and then installing it on the homemade wooden tower, Kamkawamba's machine produces electricity that then  is directed to the rooms.  Future modifications which are planned are the installation of thermal panels on the  paddles and the tower, in order to capture solar energy, also.

Kamkawamba's blog is accessible at this address and there is the possibility to contribute to his scientific development/education."

Article in the Sydney Morning Herald, Monday, July 9, 2007

This kind article appeared in Monday's Sydney Morning Herald:

Handle in the wind

An African student has found fame as a blogger just two weeks after first experiencing the internet. Elissa Baxter reports.

Riding high ... William Kamkwamba atop his windmill, which uses a bicycle to increase efficiency

 

William Kamkwamba, a 19-year-old high school student, first saw the internet at a TEDGlobal conference last month in Arusha, Tanzania. He was invited to the event - which aims to promote an exchange of ideas in the fields of technology, entertainment and design - after Malawi's Daily Times newspaper covered his efforts to generate electricity for his parents' farm by building a windmill of his own design.

The windmill is remarkable because Kamkwamba left school at 14 as his family was unable to pay the school fees. Armed only with his intelligence, a book on electricity, some plastic piping and found objects, Kamkwamba built his first windmill, which generated enough power to run a light in his room.

His second, larger windmill uses a bicycle to increase efficiency and was able to generate power for his parents' house and charge car batteries or mobile phones for people in his village.

As news of Kamkwamba's achievements spread, he was invited to the second biannual TEDGlobal conference, where his three-minute presentation about the windmill won him a standing ovation from delegates.

While at the conference, the young Malawian saw the internet for the first time and within hours began Google-searching for "windmill" and "solar energy" and was amazed with how many hits were returned for each search.

Kamkwamba was particularly impressed with the speed at which he could achieve things using the internet. "I was very excited when I saw the internet for the first time," he said. "The internet makes transfer of information very instant."

Back in Malawi, Kamkwamba applied his new knowledge about wind-powered electricity to a redesign of his second windmill, a process he detailed on the blog William Kamkwamba's Malawi Windmill (williamkamkwamba.typepad.com/williamkamkwamba), which offers step-by-step blog photos of the construction process.

The blog has since attracted global interest, with a Google search for Kamkwamba's name already generating more than 20,000 results, just a few weeks after his story became known outside Malawi.

A fellow African blogger and new friend of Kamkwamba, Soyapi Mumba, described his first impression of Kamkwamba: "What I like about William is that he didn't join the multitude of people just blaming government or policy makers for his lack of education. Neither did he point fingers at statutory corporations for the lack of electricity in his home. He didn't just sit down and blame his parents for all this, either."

Andrew Heavens, a journalist based in Khartoum, Sudan, says Kamkwamba belongs to the "cheetah" generation of Africans who are not going to wait for government and aid organisations to do things for them.

While Kamkwamba is certainly a cheetah, the migration from remote Malawian village to the global stage of cyberspace has not been achieved alone. He was assisted by US-based Tom Rielly, director of partnerships at TED and Kamkwamba's mentor. Rielly travelled to Malawi with Kamkwamba after the TEDGlobal conference and helped to establish the blog, typing while Kamkwamba dictated the content in his limited English.

With help from friends, the Malawian also set up an email address and an account on Flickr (you can search for William Kamkwamba's photos on the website).

"William was so hungry for books and reference material," Rielly says. "He asked me for a dictionary, which I brought with me to Malawi. But I told him, 'I want to show you something even better than a dictionary.' After I showed him the internet, William commented, 'With computer, you can do anything."'

Kamkwamba was to get a chance to prove whether his belief in the power of the net was correct when a computer - donated by conference sponsors in the US - was due to arrive in his village last week.

"My future plan is that I'm going to learn to research using the internet," Kamkwamba says. "Then I plan to build a water pump powered by my windmill so we can have water from the well in our house and irrigate our fields. Then, I don't know."

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