SGT Solar - Reflecting energy for community development

The Best, The Most Lively and Exciting World Cup Ever!

2010-07-11T15:18:00.005+03:00

Ghana Black Stars a.k.a Africa Stars s.k.a Bafana BaGhana is Da Best!

Africa is so Beautiful!

FIFA SA 2010 WORLD CUP ANTHEM

2010-05-08T15:57:00.001+03:00

Final reflections (yeah, yeah, I know it's not REALLY over)

2010-05-08T01:37:00.001+03:00

Final reflections are usually about what the students have learned during the course. This time it’s really hard to think of any concrete things or themes that I might have learned about. I don’t remember too much about the lectures to be honest. I remember liking the participatory methods sessions in the beginning and the workshop experiences later on. Then again I remember sitting at some of the guest speakers’ lectures and literally falling asleep. Not that the themes were not interesting, because they were. It’s just that it felt like I had heard all that before in the earlier SGT courses.

Also, towards the end of the course it just felt a bit stupid to sit at the classroom listening to some guy telling me once again about the importance of community participation in development projects, while at the same time we were really busy with the project and could have used that time working on it. It was the same old story again, and I felt like it didn’t support the project work or help me in any way with the situation we were in at the time. But who knows, if the group had been better organized and not in a terrible hurry, maybe I wouldn’t have been that stressed out and would have enjoyed the lectures as well.

So, if I didn’t learn much at the classes, maybe the project itself taught me something new? Well, not really. Turns out that lo-tech solar concentrator technologies are not exactly rocket science. Once we had come up with the design and the solutions for adjusting – and I’m not saying it was easy, it took a lot of effort and time – the rest was pretty much just about building the thing. But did I learn something new, some new skills or some new knowledge? Sure, I learned to recognize an 8 mm bolt from a distance and to use some power tools, but that’s pretty much it (still, I do value this, it might come handy later in life).

Was this all just a big waste of time then? Definitely not. I did learn a lot about myself, other people and working in a group. When I started with this course I knew that it would be a lot of hard work. Yet I didn’t have a clue of how frustrated and stressed out I would be at times. Normally with group works things have worked out quite OK, and usually the biggest problems and reasons for stress have been related to organizing the time (i.e. always starting everything way too late). Although we finally ran out of time with this project, too, I don’t think the actual problem of the group was organizing the schedule but communicating within the group.

I don’t think I’ve ever been this stressed out and frustrated because of just ten credits. At times I felt like the secret meaning of this course was that if I survive this, I would survive pretty much anything my future working life will bring me. In the end I did survive, although I have to admit that during the last month or so I thought about quitting almost daily. It would certainly have been the easy way out. However, I had already put so much effort into the project that it simply wasn’t an option anymore. This experience might not safe me from all the similar difficult situations in the future, but I have definitely learned an important lesson about how one should work in a group.

Is this the end?

2010-05-07T21:09:00.003+03:00

Now when the SGT show is over our blog readers might wonder that is this the end? The rght answear is NO! Although we quite finnished our product, it´s not ready yet. From next week we (at least half of the SGTSolar team) will continue building and propably will update the manual if we find something useful. The mondays final critique gave us some improvement proposals, that we will try to implement. The next GOAL the Maailma kylässä aka World Village festival. As Shalin is one of the exhibitors, SOLAR FLOWER is going to be there too! But before the festivals there is a lot to do to finalize our product. And as I mentioned in my previous blog update the World village is a milestone for the Solar Flower, since we will hopefully get some really useful suggestions, opinions from the audience. Place to enjoy and learn! There have been about 50 000 visitors per day in the festival in previous years so we expect nothing less this year.

So We warmly invite you all, your friends and family to come and visit us and ofcourse the whole festival! I just checked out the performers and I must say, I was amazed! Awsome bands from all around the world! And fo free!!! The festival is free of charge. You can also get exciting new taste experience too, while there are traditional kitchens from all around the globe. Nutrition for your soul and body. And the final culmination for me is the festival club. Saturdays club is funky elephant and sundays club is Balkan Fever (no vested interests :D ) Check out the whole program in www.maailmakylassa.fi We´ll update the blog as soon as we know where you´ll find us.

UV purification

2010-05-07T10:51:00.002+03:00

I have been thinking about the UV purification that Risto mentioned at the critique. I did some quick research on it, and apparently solar radiation was three effects that are believed to contribute to the disinfection of water:

UV-A interferes directly with the metabolism and destroys cell structures of bacteria.
UV-A (wavelength 320-400 nm) reacts with oxygen dissolved in the water and produces highly reactive forms of oxygen (oxygen free radicals and hydrogen peroxides), that are believed to also damage pathogens.
Infrared radiation heats the water. If the water temperatures rises above 50°C, the disinfection process is three times faster.

Basically, on a sunny day you should get clean drinking water just by placing a plastic bottle in sunlight for six hours. I wonder how fast this would be with concentrated sunlight.

Of course if we wanted to use this method with our concentrator the water might have to be at least filtered somehow, because it probably has to be clear. And we need to remember that this method only kills the pathogenic organisms but doesn't purify the water in any other way. So if the water contains for example chemicals or other materials, such as arsenic (which is a common problem globally), it would need other treatment as well.

So, would this be something we'll consider, or do we stick to the original plan (distilling water), at least for now?

Bottom Of the Pyramide- seminar and work shop. 26.1

2010-05-06T12:01:00.004+03:00

I attended the BoP- workshop wich was organised by Aalto university. The seminar was held by Peter Schartz and The workshop was in the beginning of the SGTSolar project so it gave me a lot to think and new perspectives for seeing our own project and especially the users of our product. Let me axplain first what BoP means:

As you can see in the photo the people that are normally seen as customers are the ones in the top of the pyramid. But as you can see the biggest population are the ones that earn less than 5 euros a day. So why the markets are so concentrated on the 0,5 billion? Why are the markets top-down oriented and no bottom-up oriented? These 4 billion are seen as numbers, but who are the people behind the numbers? What do they need? Can we produce the items they need? For these peolple the only certaninty is uncertainty. Irregular incomes, uncertainty about what tomorrow brings, but still- todays money money goes for todays spendings. Peple are inventing in future by repairing, renewing for maximizing the benefit of their belongigns.

The BoP consumers mindset is about minimizing the risks, making tradeoffs in purchasing descision , stategic money management and the need for proof of the items performance. BoPs are brand loyal, which might sound wierd, but by understanding that the items that theu are farmiliar with are the ones that have proofed their performance. And when there is just a certain amount of money the risk of buying something even cheaper that doesn´t work is too high, so they´ll continue buying the more expencive, but safe items.

An invention is not an invention untill it´s adopted by it´s users- John Heskett

This is a challenge to our Solar Flower aswell. We have a design and an invention, but how will the users adopt it? Hopefully we will learn a lot from the Maailma kylässä festivals, where anyone can test it and give feedback. Although we had a critique on monday, but the real judges are the Solar Flower users.

Reflections on Final critique

2010-05-06T11:11:00.004+03:00

Amazin monday I say! I am so proud of the Solar Flower team and of the other teams as well! Athough our presentation was a bit different due to beeing outdoors and our voices were fighting with the wind, I think that we nailed it. It´s amazing that our students are so professional in their works and I belive that every project was a succes. The presentations were well presented. I want to thank the teams, mentors, rewievers, listeners and SGT staff for inspirational, interesting and succesful day! The discussions were so fruitful that we deffenitely would have needed more time for them. The course and the project work taught us many useful things and beeing in a real project gave us all important lesson. Thanks for trusting your projects in students hands! I really hope that each one of the projects will continue some way!

Like Marko always says, let´s give us our selves a big hand!

Reflecting on the long Journey

2010-05-05T01:12:00.006+03:00

You can call this piece a wrap up or final reflection. I just write what I have felt throughout the long route though. Well, after this long route, hard work paid off its servants and our project – Reflecting energy for community development – comes to a fruitful conclusion with the birth of our precious product SunFlower. I believe this product is all but a monument that represents the essence of innovation and the power of unity. Moreover, it is one of its kinds that can be used by anyone as a basis to begin with to provide similar real life solutions to the target groups.

Bringing individuals of different personality in a single team to work for a common cause and achieving their goal is a monotonous task by itself. It requires bearing the frustrations and angers, respecting one another’s opinions and most importantly converging diversified individual ambitions to a single focus to boost the team energy. And sharing the fun, of course! That said, at times, heated arguments and clashes of opinions were not uncommon among our group members and I think this is one of the attributes of a group work which stretched in such a long period of time and I think it is quite Normal.

At the early stages, the more we started working together, the team dynamics developed progressively but the notion of not knowing how to organize the work seemed to take its toll on our progress. In a project of such depth, unless one sit down, split the tasks to smaller ones, dot them down and start working on them, it could be a nightmare to simply think about the final product. Before we gave the real first kick to our work, I personally, at times, thought this whole thing is a mere theory and unachievable. Once we dared to take the first step; the second was easier and then after it got as easy as taking a candy from a baby. Ok, maybe I exaggerate the fact a little bit here. But it is to emphasize the importance of organizing the task and get immersed in it for the smooth flow of the whole activity. Working on the deliverables throughout the project route was between tough and crazy though, especially the construction thing.

And then came the final day ………….

It was everybody’s pride and honor to present their thing in front of such audience and in that breathtaking atmosphere and mine was no different. I have to be honest here. I thought, at some point, that there is some sort of relationship between the names in the audience and my heart beat. The bigger the names, the faster my heart beats when I take the stages for presentations. With all the arrangements and the way things flow together, with that magical atmosphere in the room, it seemed like it was a thesis work defense before the faces of those bunches of academic personalities that crammed the room. So, let us say Hats off for all the teams who keep nerves and did great job to ensure the magnificence of their presentation. Overall, the day lived to my expectations!

We are at the very end of this long journey now with all the funs and the challenges we have shared, with the huge lessons we learnt, with all the great friends we made, along the way. I can sense mixed emotions running down my nerves right now. I am relived because I believe we as a team managed to deliver what was expected from us and from our project. On the other hand, I am afraid I am going to miss all my teammates the, teaching staff, the mentors and the casemates who all worked together as an Item for the success of this mesmerizing course – SGT. Finally, I would like to thank my team members and mentors for what we have done together. I have reaped all the benefits that working with you guys brought with it. The same is true for all parties involved.

See you again, somehow.

Oh the relief!

2010-05-05T00:18:00.003+03:00

The course is finally over then. It feels like it's been forever since we started working on the project. It's been on my mind since January, and especially during the last few weeks we've been working really long hours at the Design Factory trying to get everything done before the deadlines. So, needless to say that it was quite a relief to have returned the manual on Thursday and finally to have given the presentation on Monday (and what made it even more relieving was the fact that we had a good last minute panic going on on both days...why ruin the fun by doing things in advance, right?).

Everything hasn't gone quite as planned during the project, so all and all I'm really pleased with what we managed to put together, even though there are still some things yet to be figured out. However, I am quite confident that we will be able to solve the last little details and get Solar Flower and a working application on display in Maailma Kylässä festival. Come and see it yourself!

03 May 10: FINAL CRITIQUE

2010-05-04T23:12:00.002+03:00

The final critique was great but too long due to "something" beyond the organizers' control; so please be realistic with the timing and manage it better next time. All the teams did a wonderful job and it was nice to see how successful the projects were. However, my only regret was that, I could not talk to one particular intelligent, smart and pretty lady who was in one of the teams, after the whole show. Here we go again, the same old story. That was just by the way.

22 Mar 10: Sustainable building in Finland and the Eco Viikki case

2010-05-04T23:00:00.002+03:00

Tapio Jalo's presentation/lecture was great because eco-friendly buildings are what we need today. Moreover, energy issues are the "talk of the town" and so it was not surprising that his lecture was concentrated on energy. Furthermore, it was of interest to me because my team's project for this course was on ways of harnessing energy from the sun, which is super-green.

08 Feb 10: Practical cases of international projects: how local communities have participated?

2010-05-04T22:33:00.002+03:00

The presentations by Helena Sandman (architect), Peter Kuria (NGO, Shalin ry) and Mika Skarp (NSN) were interesting, informative and educative. Peter's presentation on foreign aid was the most interesting since that is the order of the day. Institutions that offer foreign aid to developing countries always have selfish interests and at the long run, worsen the plight of those countries. This is all because of politics and there is politics everywhere, even in the bedroom.

26 Apr 10: Large, Complex, Difficult: Doing Extreme Projects in Murky Places Around the World

2010-05-04T22:20:00.002+03:00

The presentation/lecture by Mikko Koria was OK but not all that interesting, because I have had so many project management/project risk management/project courses already and just tired of hearing project this, project that. However, such a topic is very good for this course since it is not everyone who has taken courses related to this topic.

19 Apr 10: Development cooperation project - KATHMANDU VALLEY CULTURAL TRAIL

2010-05-04T22:04:00.002+03:00

The presentation by Panu Könönen was interesting, though it is also the same old story. Making it easier for people/tourists to navigate to areas of interest by the help of the trails was good. Moreover, the tour-guide training given to the locals in assisting foreigners/tourists during sight-seeing was great because it is a form of job creation.

12 Apr 10: How to make and give good presentations

2010-05-04T21:45:00.003+03:00

The presentation/lecture by Philipp Schmidt-Thomé was quite boring because at this stage, a student, a master's student for that matter, should know how to make formal and informal presentations. We all defended our thesis works and were taught presentation skills during our bachelor's degree, I guess, so the lecture was not of interest to me. Pamela also made a contribution to the lecture by adding that, we should be practicing it in front our mirrors, our friends and families in order to get used to with; these are things I heard when I was in stage 5 and we should know these by now. So, it was the same old story over and over again. Hence, the surprise exercise for the debate and presentation was unnecessary.

15 Mar 10: Presentations of the student projects from SGT studio course 2009.

2010-05-04T21:34:00.002+03:00

The presentations of the student projects from SGT studio course 2009 were quite OK. I did not enjoy them much since I have heard those stories over and over again, so there was nothing new. Except the RCS project which was more on disaster management and recovery, I guess it was because it was something related to my field of study and could relate to the issues he talked about.

The Banana CD scratch remover

2010-05-03T23:16:00.001+03:00

What you’ll need:

* A banana
* A banana peel
* Some glass cleaner

1. Take a CD / DVD that has smudges and minor scratches on it.
2. Using a circular motion, apply a freshly cut banana to it.
3. Next, wipe it down with the banana peel. The wax from the peel will help polish and further clean the disk.
4. Take a clean cotton cloth and wipe the entire surface of the CD / DVD. Be sure to apply moderate pressure while moving in a circular motion. This should be done for around 3 to 4 minutes.
5. Finally, spray the disc with glass cleaner and wipe it clean.

Voilà! Your scratched CD or DVD should now look like new! Please note that this trick will also help you repair scratched PS2 and Xbox CD’s and DVD’s.

http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2007/08/11/how-to-use-a-banana-to-fix-a-scratched-cd-or-dvd/

Meeting on 26th April 2010

2010-04-30T19:19:00.002+03:00

We had our last official meeting with our mentor, Peter, to finalize the project. We then continued with the remaining construction work from Tuesday and spent several hours at the design factory, even up to 10:30 p.m for the Wednesday session. As you can see, we did loads of hard work behind the scene. So, I think the course assessment for our project should be 80 percent for the construction part (manual, solar concentrator, report) and 20 percent for the rest, if necessary.

Cheers

2010-04-29T22:55:00.003+03:00

It seems that after a hard hard work and a combined team effort, the long awaited project is coming to a fruitful end. Working with you guys as a team is a life time experience that I have taken a huge lesson from. Congradulations for the work done so far and more focus and hard work for the coming presentation of our brand product Solar-Flower. I hope the team will stick together and continue to further develop the product and present it for the show on world village 2010, Finland.

Hauskaa vappua!!

Test drive

2010-04-24T08:44:00.008+03:00

As Miina mentioned, we tested the first readymade panel in Design Factory with a spot light. The testing went quite ok, but we are still missing a simple solution for adjusting each panel. The theorys we had in our mind didn´t quite work as thought in real life. Here are few photos of what we did.The next photo is not a master piece, but you can get some idea ot the focal point.

On thursday we made cardboard exemplars of the panels to make the drawing easier. After that we draw the figures on the metallic plates and wen´t on friday to Kone department to cut them. Cutting was easy until we got the the point where we had to cut the small wedges between the cds. We will continute the work on monday/tuesday.

2010-04-23T13:20:00.002+03:00

Eddy and me flatened the other reflective material that we collected from Engineers without boarders. As the team already disscussed, it would be a good idea to make a couple or three panels out of this material to show that we can also develop our solar concentrator from different reflective materials. I hope Eddy and me would join forces to go to the cutting station and prepare some panels today or tomorrow. And what about the gaps between the CDs on the panels? are we yet to decided on this matter?

Logo, anyone?

2010-04-23T00:27:00.003+03:00

Now, I ain't no graphic designer, but the product needs a logo, so I thought I'd play around a little and avoid doing real things. So here's the first logo suggestion with the two name suggestions that have come up so far. Comments, please!

Problematic Panels

2010-04-22T22:46:00.003+03:00

Today was the pre-submission of the final report i.e. our manual, and so we pre-submitted, but quite a bit is still missing. The biggest single thing seems to be the panels and instructions on how to make them. We've had some problems with them during these past days: on Wednesday morning me and Irena couldn't find the time to test the adjusting properly and after that it's been all cloudy and rainy. Today we tried to do some testing with a spotlight at Design Factory, and based on that, the manual adjusting (bending the "wings" to right angle) of a single panel works. However, I am still concerned about how to make the rest of the panels. Going through every single one of them manually is a lot of work.

Right now we know the needed angles, so in theory we could make a mould of it. However, we haven't quite figured out how that would help us. First we thought of hammering the wings to the right angle with the help of wedges or the mould, but it seemed to be quite difficult to get the angle right and precise because the needed elevation is so small (0,6 mm). If we would have access to a press in the next few days, our problems might be solved. If not, we need either a brilliant innovation quickly or long hours spent at the DF. So any ideas are now more than welcome!

Introduction and manual is sufficient

2010-04-21T08:59:00.001+03:00

Hmm tomorrow is the deadline for the report and well, it needs not to be a big report as we have been working too much in the lab. So this should be short, simple manual of the product and introduction. We plannned to put pictures together with steps to make the concentrator. We may add some applications where it can be used but this is in the backlog. If team members have any other suggestions, they are welcome to share here.

Frame and panels design

2010-04-21T08:55:00.003+03:00

So we started with the design of frame last week which is almost at the end now. But we still have to make panels for the concentrator. Today's plan is to go through the panels design shaping them and trying to get same focus for all. Best of Luck team.

Pickup day

2010-04-14T22:13:00.002+03:00

Today I finished up our collection of materials. First I went to visit William, but in the corridor I bumped into Eric and we discussed shortly on how things are going with our project. He told me that he´ll come to see the presentation. William and I went to collect the reflecting metals and loaded them in to my car with the roof panels I came pu with. Then I carried all of them to Design factory, next to our other materials. So need for the gym for few days :D Now we have enough of metallic plates! Enough metallic plates to build a boat! So if want to change the plan, we could build a Buster boat XD

Oh just kiding :) So since we have good materials that are mouldable, we can try to mold the whole plate or cut them and fold each section one by one. Few things for forthcoming: The product development projects are closing up soon, so be patient in the machine room, they are as busy with their projects as we are. And William would like to see what how were doing, so he´ll visit us next week :)

BR Irena

Meeting on 12.4

2010-04-12T17:05:00.002+03:00

The whole group had a short meeting on the schedule. We decided that this week the group will meet every day at 3 and spend few hours in the design factory and start building. On next monday we will continue after our class and on tuesday we will spend the whole day in the design factory. Working on DF on sundays is not worth of planning, since the entrance is uncertain. I will bring the metallic panels on tuesday or wednesday and we will try to make them bend. The shiny metallic plates we still have to pick up, so I´ll send an email to William and ask when one of us can collect them. If it´s possible tomorrow or wednesday, I´ll pick them up and bring them to DF so that I could compensate my absence on the end of the week.

BR Irena

Shopping

2010-04-08T20:20:00.006+03:00

Irena, I and Teddy went for shopping today at 1530 hrs. We bought all the required stuff e.g. wood, thread rods, nutts, hinges etc but sorry Ed we could not buy your email items 7 to 10 :). Well, we did all the shopping from one big store so it was not roaming around for things but we really worked to chose the material. We hope you will find that we have purchased useful things. We remained well in budget and all the stuff cost like 190,63 euros for today's shopping. It was a narrow escape though :). We also put all the material in Design Factory and pasted page with "SGT SOLAR" so that others may know.

NOW LET THE REAL DESIGN BEGIN

Meeting in Design factory 01st April, 2010

2010-04-03T19:10:00.004+03:00

We had a meeting with our mentor Peter on April 01, 2010 in the Design Factory. We discussed different aspects of the design and how to improve it. We came to the conclusion that the design needs to be flexible and easy to handle. We agreed on wood structure for the frame and metal for the panels. Peter pointed out that wood is not a sustainable solution as it gets destroyed by the rain and is no longer in good shape after a while.So it is better to use metal for panels instead. We also noticed that structure should have some holdings so that it can keep the panels in one position so that we could focus easily. Then there was discussion whether the distilled water is useful or harmful for drinking. So we adapted the procedure where first water will be distilled and then passed from substance that can add minerals to it making it like mineral water in the market. That is going to be our application.
Unfortunately, we are still not sure when to buy the stuff but team was confident to get all in next week. Out model for panel was good and we will continue with that. Lets see what we make.

Jeez...Elementary school math is hard!

2010-03-31T13:42:00.005+03:00

Before leaving you guys for a while, I did some little calculations for the concentrator...

Width of one panel = 38 cm (= 3*12cm (CDs) + 2cm (just for fun))
Length of a row = 200 cm (= 5*38cm (panels) + 2 * 5cm (attachments))
The needed elevation of the furthest panel (so that we know the length of the handles) = 32 cm

At first I was being a dumbass and couldn't figure out how to solve x. I finally got it then. So if the needed elevation is 32 cm, I think 40 cm (or maybe a little less) would be a good length for the handles, since it has to go through the wood and there needs to be some space for attaching. They sell the material in 2 m long bits, so alltogether we will need 5 of those, according to these calculations.

For attaching the rows, this is what I thought of:

We'd use bolts since you need to be able to put the thing in pieces and put it together again. Do you think this attachment could work? I thought we could have the center rows and the furthest rows fixed like this (or some other way), and the two rows in the middle would be the ones you can incline if you want to reduce the efficiency of the concentrator. We still need a solution for how to rotate the rows, any thoughts on that? What's the structure of the base?

On another note, I discussed with Marko and Pamela yesterday, and it seems that the "report" is not going to be a big deal. It's 1-2 pages, and if I understood correctly it would only be a sort of an introduction to this thing we're doing. Basically something that we can present to someone, who's never heard of this project before. Why we're doing it, what's the goal of all this, why we chose to do it like we did etc. Better information about this should be sent by Pamela soonish. But so no 40 page reports, just the manual and this info thingy. Great, innit?

working at Design Factory on 29.3

2010-03-30T22:51:00.002+03:00

Despite the litlle the small relapse on sunday, the team met on monday noon. Due to short notice Majid was not able to change his schedule, but the rest of the team was present. The meetin lasted for 4 hours. The topic of the meeting was further designing the solar concentrator. To be exact, finding a simple solution on adjusting a single panel. As a result we managed to build a simple but functioning adjustment that is made out of common components. It was a lot of fun to use the machines :) We also were discussing about the cd attachment and adjustment, but we still are not sure what is the final solution on that. But we went to the machine room to learn about the possibilities of the modern machines. It seems that these few specific functions are available in the design factory.

We desided to meet on thursday at 5 pm. Due to the eastern holidays it is not certain if the design factory empty so that someone would open the door for us... If it´s closed we can have a meeting wihout the possibilities to build, and for example calculate the need of the materials, so that we could finally buy the materials. etc...

Design Factory

2010-03-28T13:16:00.001+03:00

Hmm, looks like no one could manage to go in the design factory today?

We hit the shops!

2010-03-25T19:34:00.004+02:00

Hi Team,

Mina, Madjid and myself hit the shops in the city today to buy stuffs needed for our project! We bought some materials to initiate our work. We even got to the design factory and experiment our design on a single panel. Everything seems to be going fine. We plan to launch our official design work on Sunday if the design factory is open on that day. I will check that and call you guys if it is open. I am afraid Irena would hit the roof when she learns we didn't buy Pine :) Let’s be ready for Sunday. Let the good ideas roll.

On our Final report

2010-03-24T09:28:00.008+02:00

Hey guys, I was referring some documents on how we could prepare our final report. I found some points which, I think, are worth including in our final piece. I organized the whole idea as shown below. Please Read and suggest.
Our Final report would include the following sections:

-Title and full author and team info on the first page
-Abstract (short summary of the Project)
-Introduction (motivates the project)
-Approach and methods
-Results from the project tests (how well it worked)
-Strengths and weaknesses (the good and bad parts, and why)
-Summary
-References
-Appendix

It would also be a good practice if we would be able to remember the following points while writing our final report:

- Use graphics (i.e., diagrams, graphs, tables) to illustrate our approach, but also explain it clearly in words.

- When we describe our approach, we should relate it to the key principles and ideas we learned in class. Feel free to add any other relevant references you have read which helped us with the project.

- Our references to other books/readings should be done as professionally as those in the textbook.

- Explain any original ideas and additions that are a part of our design. For failed versions of the design we would describe them briefly and explain why we eliminated them.

- We should reference the manual for some information.

- Write the report for an informed lay audience; that means we need to provide enough detail so our project could be replicated by the reader.We should explain and justify all of the important design choices.

Solar Concentrator Common applications

2010-03-22T19:58:00.015+02:00

Lets list some very common uses for solar concentrator for remote community.

Potato chips / Frying / Cooking:

This may be common use in any household living that consumes energy.

Solar Bakery:

Baking consumes a lot more energy but solar bakery would be sustainable and environmental friendly.

Desalination and getting drinking water from sea water:

Concentration purposes and Juice Extraction

Making of Jams and drying in food processing

HEATING HOME

Reflect solar light and heat into a window in house which does not get sunlight usually. This may heat the home naturally in winter as well. Natural light is more efficient and it reduces headache and eye fatigue caused by the fluorescent light. It may also help in health care reducing "Seasonal Affective Disorder".

Swimming pool heating

We may build a community center swimming pool and it may be heated with solar concentrator.

Drying paint or wood

Electricity production

Thermal engines convert heat to mechanical power which may be used to run generator that can produce electricity efficiently.

Growing vegetables in winter or shady areas

Melting ice dams on roofs

Drying wood for fire

Short discussion Monday 22 March, 2010

2010-03-22T18:14:00.003+02:00

Well, that was just short discussion today when four of us were available in the class for today's lecture. We decided to buy the material on Thursday and meet at 1600 hrs in school for that. I think two more from the group are coming with me and I will provide the transport.
Another thing that came under discussion was that we might need to work one or two days full time in the lab to make our concentrator. Someone also suggested the Sunday for full time. So may be on thursday, we may be able to decide the day for full day working in the lab.
What do you guys say, can you make it some day? What about after Easter, weekend, any commitments?

Solar Concentrator Design

2010-03-18T00:16:00.014+02:00

Concentrator Grid Dimensions: Width = 70 inches, Length = 84 inches; Each Panel, not shown here, is 14 inches x 14 inches (square)

Meeting in the design factory

2010-03-16T14:08:00.002+02:00

We held our meeting in the design factory of Aalto University on 16.03.2010. Both of our mentors, Peter and Eva, and all the team members except Madjid have participated in the meeting. The main agenda of the gathering focuses on how the physical structure of our solar concentrator and its application look like. We mainly discuss the following three points in detail some:

1. Main frame: after a heated discussion, we decided on what features should our main frame has and made from. Even if we singled out certain materials to use to build our main frame we still don't rule out any other possible alternatives.

2. Panels: we decided to build 25 panels that rest on the main frame. We discussed on the adjusting mechanisms of the panels to maintain the system efficiency. We also decided on the potential material that we could use to construct the panels but again we don't rule out possible alternatives.

3. Application: We discussed on the design and construction of the application. This task was originally assigned to Madjid. Because of his apparent disappearance, the team decided to divide the task between Edward and Tewodros.We decided that the on-paper design should be completed by 19.03.2010 so that we could order materials needed for constructing the application.

Concerning the solar concentrator, we decided to start by building the grid first.

Reflection on the workshops

2010-03-13T11:09:00.003+02:00

The experience of simulating the real life workshop in the class rooms was a great challenge and at the same times an opportunity to master the basic essence of planning and executing a real life workshop in the future. The main challenge stems from the fact that the participators are not real beneficiaries who have economic, financial or political interest on the workshop and hope to gain something out of it. This makes it very difficult to attract the attention of the participants of a simulated class room workshop as most of them have little or no idea and interest on the subject matter of the workshop.

Another challenge that I witnessed of a class room workshop is the struggle to fit all the contents of the planned workshop in a really short period of time. Sometimes we even don't get the necessary time to collect our breath before we jump form one task to another in order to manage our meager time properly. I hope we would have a much longer time than this in when we plan a real life workshop.

But I think we managed to come out of both of the above challenges with victory as we tried to plan our workshop in a sense that it would attract any neutral participant and accommodate all its components in the given period of time.
Finally, I would like to say that I feel I am privileged to experience that moment, face the challenges and share the fun with my team mates and the whole class and I hope the whole session in the consecutive two weeks gave a big lesson on how we plan our future workshops in the real world.

Adjusting a panel

2010-03-09T09:32:00.005+02:00

Yesterday me and Irena went to the Design Factory to try to figure out the adjustment of a single panel. Basically we found some cardboard-like material, drilled some holes to it, stuck nine CDs on it and tried to lift their edges so that they would reflect to a single point.

Reflection before adjusting

Adjusting the CDs to reflect to a focal point at around two metres of the panel was surprisingly easy and didn't require great accuracy. Basically we "measured" the right angles of one side CD and one corner CD by sticking a cardboard cylinder through the holes and twisting and turning it until the angle seemed right. This way we would figure out the measurements of the wedges that go under the CDs. At this point, though, we were just playing around with play dough, so we just put four "equally sized" (measured by eye) pieces of the dough under the edges of the corner CDs and and four thinner pieces under the edges of the side CDs, and voilà:

Reflection after adjusting

Perspective of the focal point

We also noticed that by curving a CD just a tiny bit (basically just giving it a little bit of pressure), you could increase the intensity of its reflection at a single point significantly. Unfortunately it can't be seen in the photo that well, unless you try hard to see it:

Reflection when curving two of the CDs

Another thing we noticed was that the adjustments worked quite well with angles and distances that were close to the originals. We were in a small space, so we didn't really test big differences in distances. However, the more the angle changed, the worse was the result:

Reflection of a light that met the panel in a bigger angle

We figured the next step could be doing this with better materials and accuracy and not just play dough, tape and rough measurements, so we might be going back later this week (possibly Friday) to do that. Feel free to join if you're available!

Amusement in the spirit of Solar concentrators

2010-03-05T15:10:00.003+02:00

See even Lady Gaga is a fan of Solar reflectors! Our project is Super Trendy! Lady Gaga is a trend setter, so it is just a matter of time that everybody is wearing portable solar reflectors!

I just wanted to wish you all a relaxing weekend and a stressless examweek!

Two steps forward and...back to square one?

2010-03-02T17:09:00.004+02:00

Today we had a short discussion about the design of the solar concentrator before we went to show the "ready" idea to William and Eric. Boy, was I wrong about it being ready. We showed them a slightly simplified version of the design that the group had talked about yesterday, and we discussed further some technical details and other stuff with William and Eric.

One thing that they both seemed to agree on, was that since the design had so many moving bits and parts (e.g. the amount of joints we had), it would be both quite expensive and - even if we manage to replace the expensive stuff with some other solutions - pretty complex to adjust. Instead they both suggested a model where we would use one big panel that would be curved to form a parabolic shape, then covering it with a reflecting material. This way the adjusting wouldn't require that much work. They had some simple sounding solutions for doing this, and they really seemed to think this was something we should concider. So, back to designing I guess..?

Peter, I remember you saying that one big panel wouldn't work. Now I'm trying to remember why. Something about wind at least, but surely that problem could be solved somehow. Were there some other reasons as well?

On another note, I'm facing a huge existential crisis. The more I search on solar concentrators the more I realize that everything has already been done. What new are we exactly bringing to the table? Even the CD idea has already been used (http://solarcooking.wikia.com/wiki/Old_CD_cooker). Oh the frustration!

The day plastic became - an opportunity!

2010-03-01T21:43:00.000+02:00

Solar Concentrator- Demo!

2010-02-28T18:37:00.001+02:00

Aluminium Foil Solar Conc.

2010-02-23T19:48:00.002+02:00

Video

Let the design begin!

2010-02-23T16:34:00.002+02:00

The whole group has spent hours and hours on investigating solar concentrators. Last monday on the work shop we even got new ideas from our course mates and their mentors. So now we are more than ready to take this to the next level! After the fruitful work shop we decided to hit our wise heads together in Desing Factory next friday 26.2 at 2 p.m. We´ll meet at the library first and walk there together.

Remember to take your enthusiasm, creativity and your supernatural skills with you!

B.R. Irena

TIPS ON DESIGNING WORKSHOPS

2010-02-20T10:36:00.003+02:00

Workshops are an extremely flexible and effective method for training, learning, development, change management, team building and problem solving, and virtually any organizational challenge.

You can actually run any sort of workshop you want - your options are as wide as your imagination and certainly not limited to off-the-shelf or tried and tested formats.

Think about and then agree openly your aim(s) for each workshop or and/or session.

Invite suggestions from delegates beforehand as to workshop subjects and aims if you want to maximise commitment and empowerment.

Split big groups into pairs or threes - this is more dynamic and produces more ideas - and gets the whole group working better, particularly when they present ideas and review with the whole group. As with teambuilding exercises, if you split into sub-teams of more than four it's advisable to have each team appoint a leader, or things can be chaotic and some members become 'passengers'.

Try to agree actions and accountabilities at the end of sessions and workshops which enable follow-up.

Tailor the content and structure of your workshop for the particular situation rather than use off-the-shelf formats. Approach it like training design - what are you (or the delegates) seeking to achieve? Be specific - more specific than just 'team-building' or 'improving relationships' - you need to identify a specific element within a general aim.

Establish and agree a measurable output(s) or result(s) that represent the aim(s), and then work back from there in thinking how to structure the workshop or session(s).

Unless you have a good reason for using laptops and projector, have the delegates use flip chart paper and coloured marker pens, and hang the sheets around the walls. This enables delegates to be far more dynamic and creative than modern technology media.

Encourage people to use creative methods that are appropriate for their personal styles and learning styles.

Visual, spatial, creative people enjoy working with flip-charts, colours, 'post-it' notes, etc.

People-centred individuals and teams enjoy human interaction - role-plays, discussions, mutual interviews, etc.

Logical, numerate, process-oriented people are happier with more structured planning tools and computers.

Think about the sort of people in the workshop groups and provide tools, materials and methods that they will be comfortable using.

Source: http://www.businessballs.com

Hope we wold have a very interesting workshop!!

TIPS ON HOW TO RUN A WORKSHOP

2010-02-20T10:07:00.006+02:00

The best and most constructive motivational team-building format is a workshop, or better still series of workshops, focusing on the people's key priorities and personal responsibilities/interest areas, which hopefully will strongly overlap with business and departmental aims too. Workshops can be integrated within regular monthly team meetings - an amazing amount of motivation progress and productivity can be accomplished with just a 90 mins workshop per month. Workshop facilitation by a team leader or manager develops leadership, and workshops achieve strong focus on business aims among team members. Workshops are very effective for training too - workshops encourage buy-in and involvement more than conventional training courses because they are necessarily participative, and the content and output are created by the delegates. Also, the relationship between workshop facilitator or workshop presenter and delegates is participative, whereas a 'trainer' is often perceived as detached, and the training material 'not invented here'.

There are many workshop format variations - here's a basic workshop format:

* Prior to workshop session identify and agree via consultation with the team the aim/opportunity area to be addressed.

* It's also important to decide workshop objectives in relation to the team's 'maturity', experience and development - refer to the Tuckman 'forming storming norming performing' model, and the Tannenbaum and Schmidt model to understand and agree the level of freedom and responsibility to give the team during workshops, and in agreeing workshop follow-up actions and responsibilities.

* Set suitable date and venue for meeting and issue agenda, with verbal explanation/reassurance if necessary.

* At start of workshop, introduce aim and process - agree expectations - answer queries. (5 mins)

* Brainstorm the ideas and opportunities with the whole group - flip chart is best. (10-20 mins)

* Split the group into pairs or threes (more usually creates passengers) and ask them to come up with outline actions/initiatives/plans to achieve agreed purpose/aim. (20-30 mins)

* Have groups present back their ideas - review and praise positives aspects in each, and gently agree areas which would benefit from improvement/refining. (max 5 mins per group)

* Then task and agree for groups or individuals to refine outline plans into clear objectives (refer to SMARTER principles), during the workshop, or afterwards to be fed back to manager, which can then be followed up and coached during implementation.

* Follow up, coach, encourage, support and invite ideas for future workshop items and process improvements.

Hope we wold have a very interesting workshop!!

Source:www.businessballs.com

Meeting with Eric

2010-02-17T23:33:00.001+02:00

Last Tuesday Irena, Peter and myself went to meet Eric Coatanéa, who is a professor of development process and system engineering. The idea was to discuss about the facilities where we would soon start developing our solar concentrator. Eric took us to Design Factory, which is Aalto University's new (started in 2008 I think) product design and learning facility. We took a little tour around the place, and boy, it looked great! I'm confident that we will find anything we need there, in terms of premises, tools and skilled helpful personnel. Couldn't hope for a better designing environment! The guys working there told us we could go and reserve room for us once we are more clear about the schedule. And some premises were even available without reserving them.

We also discussed the project itself, and since Eric is a professional, especially the designing phase. Eric gave us some good hints and points to take into consideration when designing the product. Since none of us has done any product development before (I think...or have you guys?), I think we should really try to get all the useful information out of these professionals that seem to be glad to help us.

Later we returned at the department of mechanical engineering, where Eric's office is. We met some of his colleagues, including William Brace, who I think has also been following our project a little. The guys at the department promised we could borrow their legos (these guys play with them A LOT) when figuring out the possible design. When shall we have a play day?

All in all, it was a great meeting. Nice to see that things seem to start to work out little by little.

Monday Feb 1st Meeting

2010-02-14T23:08:00.001+02:00

In our meeting on Monday Feb 1st, the whole group and mentors were present. We discussed the following points:

1. Blog
Everyone should participate in blog writing. After each lecture, one group member will be responsible for writing a more general entry including his/her own reflections, that others can comment on. Otherwise everyone is encouraged to write and discuss about anything related to the project.

2. Work plan
We discussed about the current work plan chapters and how they should be developed. The responsibilities were distributed as follows:
- Miina: Write a general introduction
- Eddie: Edit project scope and description chapters
- Majid: Write about information dissemination and sustainability of the project
- Irena: Project objectives and their indicators
- Teddy: Edit the timeline of the project.

3. Workshop
The upcoming workshop was also under discussion. We agreed that the workshop could work as forum where we could get fresh ideas about the general structure of the solar concentrator, focusing of panels, different applications etc.

4. Materials
We ended the meeting with some general discussion on the project. Possible materials were especially under discussion. Irena had a great thought about using CDs as reflectors. Other possibility that we talked about was aluminium foil. We agreed we would do some further research on the two reflector materials in terms of reflectivity, durability, focusing etc.

Reflections on 8.2 lecture

2010-02-14T17:41:00.001+02:00

The presentations form Shalin, Nokia Siemens Netrworks and State of art prize won Ukumbi organization were idea-rich examples of successful development projects. The approach towards projects was something that our own SGT team should learn from. I feel that the key for the successfulness in all these cases is the learning part. Precise learning and observing the culture, everyday life and needs of the locals and recognising the different stakeholders makes sure that the projects are fully adopted by the locals. When the target individuals and the whole group understands and sees the benefits of the project the vital commitment is likely to happen. For the project planners adjusting minds from western to local ideology, humble attitude and not making naïve assumptions is of great worth. In development projects many things can go wrong and therefore constant learning requires learning from ones mistakes and self-criticism. Mika Skarp´s idea advice for designing projects and products was nicely compact and catchy: Availability, affordability, usability and sustainability.

Sustainable Development

2010-02-12T12:42:00.007+02:00

Renewable Energy

Reflecting on Peter's Lecture

2010-02-11T11:27:00.003+02:00

Hey Peter,

This is particularly for you! I really appreciated the piece of lecture that you delivered last Monday about your company's project activities in different areas like energy, agriculture and environment. It was great. Here I am interested to mention one point from your lecture which left me a bit confused. It was even asked by one of the audiences that day and you gave further explanation. But I am still confused :) It is about the notion of "Community". you said it does not exist in Africa and there is no such thing as a ''community project". I thought we were doing a project for a certain community in Africa such as the rural community. So, could you please help clear my confusion on the idea? Or anyone from the Group?

Thank you!

Adding on the PING PONG thing

2010-02-11T11:06:00.006+02:00

Here are the pictures for the PIGN PONG. But we may use even much cheaper and affordable support for the CDs than the PING PONG for our workshop demonstration. I will try to google out possible alternatives and post it if I discover any soon. It would be food for thought for everybody until we meet on monday :)

Ping-Pong CD Solar Concentrator

2010-02-09T19:42:00.001+02:00

Look at the title of this post, understood anything? The last two words are okay but got any guess whats that pingy pongy stuff. Well, let your inner curious feeling read the rest of the post to satisfy itself.

Ping-Pong CD Concentrator is an idea that flashed into my mind when I saw the shiny side of a pile of useless CDs & DVDs lying on my desktop. The ping-pong element comes from a common plastic ping pong ball thats used to play table tennis. I was a table tennis player in school.
So, imagine a CD placed on a ping pong ball with shiny side up. Ball fits into the hole in centre of CD and if you fix the ball there, what you get is a kind of rotating mirror which can rotate 2 sides either right-left or front-back. Lets visualise it;
http://sunenergyworld.blogspot.com/2006/10/ping-pong-cd-solar-concentrator.html

The Kamppi summit

2010-02-08T19:26:00.003+02:00

On february 2, 2010 the team held its third meeting in Kamppi with the presense of team mentors Peter and Eva, coordinating mentor Ulla and all the team members except Edward who couldn't be available due to bad flu. The summit was kicked off at 13:40 and lasted about an hour and half discussing the following main agendas

1. Project Plan

The team discussed on the submitted draft of the project plan with Ulla.First, the team members explained about every aspect of the project plan and comments were given by Ulla on what should be corrected, improved and kept. We also cleared our confusion on the scope of the vision of our projet as we previously thought that our project is a "world saviour" rather than a class room project. We desided to revise our project plan in accordance with the new found perspective. But we also decided to include the big picture as a second phase in the project plan.

2. Team communication strategy

We discussed how we could device an effective and sustainable communications among the team members, the mentors and the course staffs to avoid unnecessary confusions throughout the project work. With the help of the team mentors we learned to use some Google Docs features. we decided to use these features in our future activities so that every member of the team would be informed of the activities of every other member of the team regarding the project work.

Luminescent Solar Concentrators Explained

2010-02-05T00:20:00.007+02:00

But solar concentrators alone don’t signal the start of a new solar age. Baldo addresses the considerable uncertainty around the broad deployment of solar power. Installation costs for single homes appear formidably high, perhaps 2/3rd the cost of the entire system. Colossal solar fields that might replace fossil fuel burning plants must ship their energy across vast distances, losing electricity along the way. And right now the national power grid isn’t set up to handle the fluctuations in energy that large-scale intermittent energy sources such as solar or wind present. Clouds are a “big pain” for grid operators, says Baldo.

Reflection on Participatory Methods II: What it takes to be a good Facilitator?

2010-02-01T21:58:00.003+02:00

Today’s session focuses on how to facilitate a team and what it takes to be a good facilitator. The string of interactive activities that we carry out throughout the session helps to practice the facilitator’s role in a team environment. We discussed some contents of our project plan like the objectives, means, indicators and alternatives with the help of different facilitators from different groups. The facilitators ask questions, commented and criticize our way of doing our things as they tried to help solve our problems. I was wondering why it was important to assign a facilitator form another group while it is possible to choose one among our own group members. But I felt the differences sooner rather than later when I took my sit to facilitate a neighboring group. Last session when I facilitate my own group, everything seemed went smoothly as I am used to the concepts of my own project and the people around me. But this time, as I tried to facilitate a different team, I had to struggle a bit to immerse myself in to the moment as I was a bit strange to the ideas on the table and the people in the group in comparison to my own. So, I came to understand that choosing the facilitator from another group could help the facilitator to develop the ability to quickly adapt to dfferent challenges in different environments and discuss on them with the group members to help them solve their problems.
But what should we mainly do as a facilitator and of course as a good facilitator? All of the three facilitators I witnessed on my group table showed some of the characters of a good facilitator as all managed to create a vibrant atmosphere in the group by making open ended questions and inviting everybody to discussion and commenting on our opinions. They also managed to present the process of the discussion and the outputs to the crowed. Personally I had the chance to speak to the crowd twice in today’s session. The first presentation was just to discuss the contents of the group’s project plan and the second time as a facilitator for a certain group. The first time I faced the audience, it just felt insane. The second was better as I became somewhat familiar to the faces in front of me from my first experience. I hope three and more will be fun.

Reflecting on Participatory Methods By Dr. Paula Siitonen

2010-01-31T11:18:00.002+02:00

Concerning the issue of constructive dialogue, I think both Respecting ones idea and disagreeing with ones idea are essential. But I see some degree of contradiction between the two. Is that a kind of trade-off that we should compromise? I am not clear with the idea of "Disagreeing while respecting" or what 'disagreeing smartly' is all about.

Participatory Methods by Dr. Paula Siitonen on 25.01.2010

2010-01-30T18:32:00.003+02:00

The lecture or forum was centered on ways of creating sustainable improvements and cooperation in complex environments. Through the participatory methods, we were able to create a shared understanding of our task and the actors involved. As a result, we identified the stakeholders and their respective roles in achieving our objective(s). In addition, we had the chance to learn from the other teams through the “exhibition walk”. Lastly, but not the least, we understood how constructive dialogue can be used to gather information and then choose the best through a focused discussion.

SIMPLE APPLICATION OF SOLAR CONCENTRATOR

2010-01-29T09:17:00.003+02:00

Water is fed at one end of the coiled tube and as it passes through the coil it vapourizes and changes to steam. The steam can be collected from the other side of the tube and can be used for a range of applications from distillation to driving a small turbine to produce electricity.

Minutes of the meeting

2010-01-28T22:09:00.002+02:00

We discussed the following points in our meeting on Monday 25th Jan, 2010 attended by all the group members and the mentor.

1. The mentor and members discussed the project plan and its different aspects.
2. We agreed that initial project plan should be started as soon as possible.
3. There were three phases realized for the project. Research phase, implementation phase and documentation phase.
4. Tasks were divided among the group members for the research phase.
5. Also the access for the lab where actual model will be designed was also discussed.
6. We agreed to go for and implement at least one application for the solar concentrator.
7. Blog creation also came under discussion.
8. A detailed project review was discussed and points drawn on paper showing relevant works to be done with respect to the time.
9. We decided to make simple manual and prototype.
10. Teddy will make an initial schedule for the work plan and Irena would start with some basic information. They will do this asap and others will add information and by monday we will have first version of the project plan to show the staff.

Stakeholder Analysis

2010-01-28T19:06:00.002+02:00

We identified 3 categories or groups of stakeholders in the solar reflector project; the community group, the technical or implementation group and the media.

The community group, main beneficiary, was further subdivided into the various institutions that make-up or constitute the whole rural area. These subdivisions were the schools, hospitals and local government(s). Schools would be able to power their laboratory systems and lighting class rooms for smooth running of academic activities. Hospitals would also have uninterrupted power supply to help save lives. The locals would also enjoy constant electricity supply to facilitate or enhance their daily activities.

The technical or implementation group was also subdivided into the SGT team, MKFC, Shalin ry and SMEs or SMBs. The SGT team and MKFC will act more like consultants for Shalin ry and the SMEs or SMBs. In addition, the SGT team is responsible for designing, implementing, testing and, creating the operating manual or instructions to assist Shalin ry (NGO) and the SMEs or SMBs in their work or businesses. Since MKFC deals more in eLearning, education materials on maintenance, security and operation of the solar reflector would be created and put online for easy access.

Lastly, but not the least, the print and electronic media group, both local and international, will be disseminating information on the use and benefits of the solar reflector through programs designed by the SGT team and MKFC.

Solar Power Dish from car parts

2010-01-28T09:55:00.001+02:00

Science & Technology (solar)

Photo: Stirling Energy Systems

New and Improved Solar Thermal Collection Dish
While a lot of people think about photovoltaic panels when "solar power" is mentioned, solar thermal must not be underestimated. One of the players in that field is Stirling Energy Systems (SES), who we've written about before when they set a new world record for "solar-to-grid system conversion efficiency" (31.25 percent, beating the previous record of 29.4 percent). Well, in collaboration with Sandia National Laboratories, SES has refined its SunCatcher design. Read on to find out how the new version compares to the old one.

http://africaclimate.org

Background on Solar Concentrators Wiki Link

2010-01-27T23:47:00.001+02:00

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentrating_solar_power

Concentrated solar thermal (CST) is used to produce renewable heat or electricity (generally, in the latter case, through steam). CST systems use lenses or mirrors and tracking systems to focus a large area of sunlight onto a small area The concentrated light is then used as heat or as a heat source for a conventional power plant (solar thermoelectricity).

A wide range of concentrating technologies exist, including the parabolic trough, Dish Stirling, Concentrating Linear Fresnel Reflector, Solar chimney and solar power tower.[6] Each concentration method is capable of producing high temperatures and correspondingly high thermodynamic efficiencies, but they vary in the way that they track the Sun and focus light. Due to new innovations in the technology, concentrating solar thermal is becoming more and more cost-effective.[7]

A parabolic trough consists of a linear parabolic reflector that concentrates light onto a receiver positioned along the reflector's focal line. The receiver is a tube positioned directly above the middle of the parabolic mirror and is filled with a working fluid. The reflector follows the Sun during the daylight hours by tracking along a single axis. A working fluid (eg molten salt[8]) is heated to 150-350 °C as it flows through the receiver and is then used as a heat source for a power generation system.[9] Trough systems are the most developed CSP technology. The Solar Energy Generating Systems (SEGS) plants in California, Acciona's Nevada Solar One near Boulder City, Nevada, and Plataforma Solar de Almería's SSPS-DCS plant in Spain are representative of this technology.[10]

Building a Solar Concentrator in Kenya

2010-01-27T21:25:00.002+02:00

SGT Solar: Concentrator

2010-01-27T19:03:00.000+02:00

The SGT course has two key components
1. Lectures
2. The Group work

The group work for SGT Solar is to investigate the concept of solar concentrators and their application.

At the end of the course, the students will be masters of the Solar Concentrator Technology, its applications and will ultimately develop a prototype and one application.

At the same time, they will be able to develop learning and instructional material on solar concentartors for "dummies".

The team consists of 5 highly motivated individuals and two mentors. Through this blog you will get to know them, their anger, frustrations and big dreams!!

I look forward to the Month of May when the students will have finalised this studio course and their participation at the World Village at the end of May 2010!