Jambo everyone! On the 12 February we were visited by five members of Echoing Green to examine our state of development here in Bungoma. (Echoing Green is an organization that sponsors a select number of social enterprises each year with funding, social networks and expertise.) To our luck, they brought the first rain drops in [...]
Short answer: at least 50. Elaboration: Our Shop-In-A-Box has produced 50 climate kilns in just 4 days, thanks to the hard work of Tom Ochieng and Paul Manda. Even faced with numerous continuing technical challenges, our first 2 hires in Kenya have proved themselves capable of exceeding our initial production goal of 300 units per month. [...]
In January, we at re:char brought four new folks to join us here in Bungoma. In this blog post, we introduce you to them and a team member that joined re:char in the end of 2011 but we did not introduce here earlier. Tom Odoyo joins re:char as a top-notch engineer. Before joining re:char, he [...]
It is with great exhaustion, occasional disaster, and much pride that I present Western Kenya’s newest factory: re:char Shop-In-A-Box #001. In the end, delivery took 4 and a half months: over twice as long as we had hoped and planned. The delivery truck had performance issues, to put it mildly: if I shifted our Land [...]
As leaders in the biochar space, the re:char team tries to stay at the bleeding edge of emerging trends. We’ve come up with a list of predictions for the coming year and beyond. Comment around this time next year to see what we got right (assuming the world doesn’t end in 2012): The Black [...]
In November, re:char leased a nearly 6-acre piece of land in Bungoma, Kenya. Located on the highway less than a kilometer from downtown Bungoma, the property is ideally situated. Farmers from town and the interior can easily arrive by public transport, and larger 18-wheeler transporters can also conveniently pull off from the road that connects [...]
I presented some of my ideas about shipping containers to Dorkbot Austin yesterday, and a good time was had by all (especially me). Here’s video: And, here’s the presentation: I think I’ve got a useful (and sexy!) object of my infatuation:)
As we’ve written before, there are many exciting and technically advanced efforts in the field of clean cookstoves. These efforts seek to solve the indoor air pollution problems associated with wood fuels, thereby improving the lives of millions of women and children worldwide. Many of these stove technologies also cite reductions in carbon [...]
We’re excited any time one of our climate kilns is purchased. But, one recent deployment was particularly thrilling: our friends at Carbon Roots International have successfully deployed a climate kiln as part of their CharBon Project in Haiti. To minimize shipping costs, they chose the DIY kit; a local tinsmith easily handled the 55-gallon drum conversion. Here are [...]
With the growing trend of converted shipping container homes popping up all over town, re:char has decided to join the revolution, but with a twist; we are building a metal workshop out of a shipping container instead. Complete with lighting, ventilation, electrical wiring, re:char’s container will house a most exciting spin on the shipping container [...]
