The Solar Stove Project - 2023-24

Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the Americas, only surpassed by Haiti. The people of one community in the Managua area are called the "dirty or forgotten people." They are marginalized and excluded from the central community, but they remain hopeful for a better life despite these conditions.

Unfortunately, many of the school-age children in this community go hungry due to food scarcity. However, with some funding from a church group abroad, they have secured small amounts of money to provide these children with a tiny meal a day before school. One of the significant obstacles they face is the high cost of electricity, as Nicaragua has some of the highest electricity rates in the world. The cost of electricity is so prohibitive that they have to spend a large percentage of it on cooking the food.

To help address this issue, the CGEN Capstone, in collaboration with Winds of Change and RJI, proposes a basic solar PV installation. This would provide them with ongoing renewable energy, removing the burden of extreme electricity costs and allowing them to allocate more funding to the cost of goods to feed these children. Resolving this seemingly minor issue can open doors to these children's futures through education.

Please see below for some photos of the proposed community.

Phase 1 Success! - Update March 2024

The team travelled to Granada, Nicaragua, from March 7 to 11, 2024, and completed Phase 1 of the Solar Stove Project.

Our goal was to get a "base system” in place to offset the majority of the electricity costs they’ve been experiencing. During our time on-site, we successfully installed a 4-panel, 4-battery system with a Hybrid Inverter to share power between the grid and the Solar PV system. The Grid will now ONLY be used if the batteries are run down to a level that the system auto-switches to Grid backup.

The realities of this community were heartbreaking to see in person. Only a few km away is the heart of tourism, Granada, where people enjoy semi-luxury and, right here, slums of families that work as sex workers, drug dealers or garbage pickers to make a few dollars a day to survive.

The reality of this project hit home, seeing that they can now dedicate almost 100% of their funds to raw food costs, which had previously been split up to 50% before this system was enabled.

After only two weeks in operation, we can already see that the Grid has not been used, and 100% of the power is now sourced from the Sun!

Some additional trip photos are included below.

A huge thanks to all who contributed both time and funds to make this happen for us.