Low Technology

Technology has brought us many modern conveniences that we often take for granted. Everyday appliances like refrigerators, water heaters, and stoves are so prevalent that it is quite hard for most people to picture a life without them. How about the estimated 20% of the world population without access to electricity (link: “Access to Electricity”)? We are going to briefly discuss how some of these modern conveniences can be brought to rural regions at a low-cost: both environmentally and economically.

Zeer Pot

Introducing the pot-in-pot refrigerator, also known as the Zeer pot, keeps the inner chamber of the device cool by the means of evaporative cooling (water absorbs relatively large amount of energy when transitioning from liquid to vapour). The device is constructed using easily obtainable items: two clay pots; a piece of cloth; some sand; water (which need not be potable as it is kept separated from the food storage), and requires no electricity. Below is a video on how you can make your own:

Food can be stored fresh for a longer period of time with refrigeration, this is important in places where there is a food shortage, extending the shelf life of food is a matter of survival. Farmers can also benefit from the increased profit from food sales as food can be stored for a longer period of time giving economic and social benefits to the community.

A modern lecturer Mohammed Bah Abba has modernized the evaporative cooling principle and commercialised it for modern Nigeria, distributing it under his company Mobah Rural Horizon. A Zeer pot only cost around £1 to manufacture and Bah Abba reportedly sells 30000 such pots a year in rural Nigeria (link: “The Shell Award for Sustainable Development”). In addition, an inventor Emily Cummins came up with the Sustainable Refrigerator that gave the pot-in-pot cooler a contemporary design.

Solar Cooker

Solar power can be harvested by solar panels, but often they require proper maintenance and may release toxic chemicals (e.g. lead and cadmium) in case of damages or improper disposal.Solar concentrators may serve as an alternative method to tap into solar energy and have already been use in solar power plants. The solar concentrators can also be used to cook food, it works by reflecting sunlight into a smaller area and therefore heating any object within that point.

Solar cookers come in a few different varieties and can provide an alternative to firewood in the absence of electricity and liquid petroleum gas. About 2 billion people still use firewood; introducing solar cookers will reduce the rate of deforestation and carbon dioxide emission. In addition, the cooker also allows people in rural area to pasteurize their drinking water, reducing instances of ingesting water borne pathogens. See how you can build one easily in the video above.

Solar cookers in various forms have been applied in other places like Africa, China, India and Gaza. Solar Cookers International is one of the non profit organisations that distributes and provides education to rural African regions regarding solar cooking. They have also commercialised their products and sell solar cooker merchandise on their website for other outdoor cooking purposes.

But I have refrigerators and kitchen stoves!

You most likely have access to powered refrigeration and cooking facilities and I doubt anyone is preparing to go without them any time soon. However it has been shown by people like Bah Abba and Solar Cookers International that low-tech solutions could commercialised to various degrees of success in niche market, partly due to the low cost of implementation and high availability of their building materials within the local market. While they could have easily been dismissed as mere life-hacks, innovations have turned them into profitable (financially and/or socially) businesses.