Sanergy

We've moved to a new home

2010-11-01T16:51:00.005+03:00

We've moved to our new home: saner.gy

Come visit us there or email us at info@saner.gy

Mr. Muscle Returns to the Rescue

2010-09-19T02:41:00.000+03:00

At Sanergy, our focus is on cleanliness because a clean toilet is a useable toilet. A few weeks back, I had the privilege of accompanying a CCS team to clean some toilets in the Kwangware slum in Nairobi. That's where I first ran into Mr. Muscle. Back then, we promised a closer collaboration and partnership with the amazing folks at CCS.

As promised, they have returned. And they brought along Mr. Muscle as well! Given CCS's experience cleaning and rehabilitating some of the worst toilets in Nairobi, we approached them to partner with us in building and implementing a training program for our toilet operators to keep the new Sanergy pilot toilets spotlessly clean. In addition to the training, Sanergy will be sourcing all their cleaning chemicals and equipment from CCS, an SC Johnson Company.

Below are some pictures from the training session in Kibera.

Positive -> Negative -> Positive

2010-09-03T16:02:00.000+03:00

Mold Making in Kenya

The bulk of our success in constructing the pilots relied on the team's ability to make the molds for precasting the concrete forms. The team first split up: Joel, being fluent in swahili, navigated the Gikomba marketplace daily to make quick mock-ups of the molds for testing; Ani scoured the industrial district for fabricators to establish contracts for the roll-out; and Ella went to the University to recruit local talent; in doing so she wandered into the FabLab.

FabLab

Though not widely advertised, the facility located within the University of Nairobi Mechanical Engineering Building functions as a state of art, stand-alone technology park. Setup in affiliation with the FabLab at MIT, it is equipped with a large bed CNC routing machine, laser cutter, 3D scanner/printer, teleconferencing capabilities, and more. This level of modernity is a rare find in a city of people that take pride in their resourcefulness, but that is another discussion all together.

When Ella first met Kamau Gachigi, Director of the FabLab. He explained that by sponsoring local projects the FabLab hoped to enable innovation and prepare projects and/or businesses to be competitive in the world marketplace. After describing our project Kamau was extremely accommodating; recommending material sources, recruiting help, and contacting student operators. Which is how Ella met teammate Tom Odoyo. Tom was irreplaceable, putting his own windmill project on hold to become part of the Sanergy team throughout the summer.

The CNC Router provided us a means to fabricate a highly accurate form of the floor plate out of fiber board that we used as a plug from which we created our mold for casting. Being that the floor plate was the interface between the walls of the superstructure and access to the containers in the substructure it required a level of precision that was not likely to be found using make-shift methods.

Having already modeled the floor plate in 3D we split the form into stratus layers, the thickness of our MDF board, which we later laminated together to get our 3 foot wide by 5 foot long and 6 inch tall floor plate. Splitting time at the machine, working late into the night and through the inevitable hick-ups we were able to route out a floor and corner piece in just over a week.

Unclear as to the best method to use the (positive) plug to form our (negative) mold we looked into the commonly used rammed sand and aluminum cast and also casting it straight into concrete, but decided on having a fiberglass mold made for a heightened level of accuracy. For this step, we contracted the services of experienced folks at Specialised Fibreglass. With their help, the mold was further developed to incorporate tapered edges so it would easily release each cast.

The other molds consisting of 5 walls, 4 corners, 4 foundation posts, and a roof ring were made from steel.

Painting Kibera Blue

2010-08-31T20:52:00.002+03:00

A few days ago, we finished construction of our second pilot site in Kibera. As one of the largest slums in the world, Kibera is home to nearly 1m people. The 3 sq. miles that Kibera stretches is divided into 8 villages. We are working in Soweto West with our community partner Carolina for Kibera. The pilot site will be operated by the Zulu Youth Group.

We've spent the past couple of posts explaining the model and the design. So we'll get straight to the pictures this time. This time around we documented the construction process in detail to show exactly what it takes to put together a prefabricated ferrocement ecosan toilet in the slums of Nairobi.

From Concept to Reality

2010-08-29T11:29:00.000+03:00

Sanergy Design

The design process for the Sanergy EcoSan Toilet began with an intense brainstorming session at the MIT Sloan Entrepreneurship Center throughout the month of June with revisions continuing well into the team's time in Kenya.

Sanergy's design goals were generally to create a toilet that was both economical and socially sustainable; and specifically for the pilot to 1) create a low-cost building solution under US$500, 2) design an efficient system for the ease of construction, and 3) provide a low-maintenance system for ease of operations. It was essential that the units be highly cost effective in order to make personal ownership attainable to entrepreneurs, yet not at the expense of its ability to attract and retain paying customers over its life cycle.

Low-cost construction:

In order to reach the largest population of users possible the model needed to be sustainable, scalable, and financially viable. Cost-saving techniques drove the team to consider using a building technique not yet used in Kenya called ferrocement. The structural components of the toilet were constructed of precast cement panels reinforced with chicken wire; just 1.5 inches thick, the unit mass was greatly reduced from that of a typical mortar and brick construction. Adorned with readily available bush-pole and corregated sheet roofing and doors, then finished with off-the-shelf collection containers and squat pan the design was economical to produce and maintain.

The precast process helped to control quality and cost of the panels. (Look for a post coming soon about the mold-making process.) Casting at a central location helped to ensure proper curing and limits material waste by using trained labor. After scale-up there would be significant benefits to buying material in bulk; including, economies of scale and flexibility to ride-out price hikes. Not fully developed in the pilot, the unit was designed to be a flexible, modular design that could be grouped to share walls and foundation posts, further saving on material.

Easy assembly: Precast panels, interlocking joints, one day assembly, limit skilled labor

Fast and easy assembly reduced the construction cost and time. It was essential to getting the business up and running as quickly as possible. Precast panels made for a fast assembly and reduced the need for skilled labor on-site. Because the units were fabricated off-site, the pieces were brought in and assembled for use in one day.

The design aimed to preempt elements of construction and maintenance into the cast forms. The corner panels were designed to receive the wall panels, which was received by the monolithic floor plate and roof ring which locked the whole assembly together without using fittings. Tongue and groove connections relieved the need for on-site mortar and resolved concerns of using typical screw connections which would likely have exposed the chicken wire to water penetration and compromised the structure.

Using a the panel system reduced the area required for construction; only a 3 foot by 5 foot clear area, with no need for formwork or material storage, spaces that had been written-off in the past for being too small were reconsidered. Also, rather than the deep pits commonly associated with latrines in the settlements, the Sanergy EcoSan Toilet used shallow foundation tubes which eliminated the need for deep digging and stable soil.

Low-maintenance:

Precast concrete combined the benefits of high durability with low maintenance. Because all of the sealants and hardeners were integrated into the floor surface it requires little to no maintenance. Many design considerations were taken into account to promote perceived cleanliness. Plasticizer, water-proofer, and fiber reinforcement added in the mix the panels were cast with interlocking joinery so they were ready-to-use straight from the mold, without any further plaster, paint, or mortar required. Filleted corners along the low-wall of the floor plate and in the L-shaped corner panels helped to eliminate crevices that would normally collect dirt. A slope was molded into the floor surface to promote wash water flowed toward the drainage hole in the floor.

Kenya proved to be full of unforeseen challenges which required the team to remain adaptive. During the construction of the pilot some additional reinforcement was added on-site due to time constraints on mold edits and cast curing. Also paint and plaster was added because of discoloration in the panels due to casting conditions. These conditional and aesthetic issues will be worked out in the future to further reduce the cost of construction from the pilot model. Until then the team will continue to monitor the maintenance procedures of the pilots and train local youth groups on operations.

Lunga Lunga! Hip Hip Hooray!

2010-08-25T21:26:00.000+03:00

We have completed construction of our pilot site in Lunga Lunga. According to Cities Alliance, approximately half of the slum’s nearly 20,000 residents work in the nearby industrial area, and most of the remainder work in small businesses within the village. Despite that relatively steady income stream, fewer than 5% of the area’s 3000 structures have toilets (again, according to the Cities Alliance report). As in other informal settlements throughout Nairobi, many Lunga Lunga residents use “flying toilets,” as well as the river that runs along the slum’s border.

Our toilet in Lunga Lunga is on the grounds of a Bridge International Academies school. Bridge is a social enterprise that's building low-cost (i.e., $4/month), high-quality private primary schools in the slums. The company opened its first school January of 2009 and is now operating 10 schools throughout Nairobi. We’re excited about our partnership with Bridge because, like Sanergy, the organization is building a scalable business to provide high-quality and much needed services in the city’s informal settlements.

At this site, we’re also partnering with the Lunga Lunga Youth Group. The community-based organization currently has 40 members and is running several small businesses that both benefit the neighborhood and generate a modest income for its members. Over the past couple weeks, the youth group has played an active role in the site’s construction, and throughout the pilot, they will be responsible for waste collection and processing.

A Sanergistic Team, Sehemu Mbili (Part Two)

2010-08-23T21:49:00.005+03:00

It has been a grueling few weeks. We have been busy fabricating, installing, and finishing our precast ferrocement toilets at our pilot sites in Kibera and Lunga Lunga. We’ve been able to complete the two sites in large part thanks to the help of our Nairobi-based team members.

Originally from the Kisumu area, Tom Odoyo is entering his final year of the mechanical engineering program at the University of Nairobi. We met Tom at the FabLab set up by MIT in partnership with the University of Nairobi. As a jack of all trades, he has extensive experience in digital fabrication. Ella and Tom and spent long hours at the lab milling parts of our prototype on the CNC machine. His interest in renewable energy – including ongoing work building a wind turbine and a flexible biodigester – blended well with Sanergy’s goals. Needless to say, his contribution to the group has been invaluable.

Lucas Wesonge is entering his final year at the University of Nairobi. For the past four years, he has been studying civil engineering with a focus on infrastructure. Lucas is interested in working in a rapidly developing country like Sudan, and the speed of construction with ferrocement piqued his interest. Ultimately, Lucas decided to intern with Sanergy to get hands-on experience with new techniques and to apply these techniques to benefit local communities. Throughout our work in the communities of Kibera, Lunga Lunga, and the industrial area, his outgoing, jovial personality remained quite infectious.

Upon graduating in November with a degree in water engineering from the Kenya Water Institute, Pius Ondoi intends to use his “skills and knowledge in the community, at the primary level, to help eradicate poverty.” We’re certainly glad that he has already begun working toward that career aspiration even before graduating! Not only did Pius's interest in wastewater treatment fit well with Sanergy's focus on human waste management and processing, but also his previous internship experience constructing classrooms, water tanks, and pit latrines with Concern Worldwide in Kisumu, his own hometown, has been extremely useful as we built out our two pilot sites.

Born and raised in Nairobi, Ken Owade has long been a community organizer and leader here. Following his run for public office representing Kibera in the 2007 elections, Ken co-founded the Smart Club CBO where he continues to work on issues of civic education, peace, and democracy. His extensive involvement in the Kibera community and his experience mobilizing the youth was exactly what we need in our partnerships with the youth groups in Lunga Lunga and Kibera to operate the pilot centers. As the Field Manager, Ken will continue to run the daily operations for the Sanergy pilot over the next year.

It's not (just) about the toilets

2010-08-10T08:16:00.001+03:00

When people hear the statistic that 2.6Bn, or nearly 40% of the world population, lack access to proper sanitation, the typical reaction is to propose building more latrines. But it's not (just) about the toilets. Here at Sanergy, we have maintained that reliable sanitation services must include provisions for the 3Ts: toilets, transportation, and treatment of the waste. But most importantly all three of these critical portions of the sanitation infrastructure need to be tied into a viable business environment. Private sector organizations with the necessary skills to invest and manage this infrastructure can provide these sanitation services with no subsidies and no aid.

We are glad to see others join our call to create an integrated approach to sanitation services delivery. Sandec, the Department for Water and Sanitation at Eawag (Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology) published an article in this month's Water Policy titled 'Making urban excreta and wastewater management contribute to cities' economic development: a paradigm shift'. To paraphrase from the article, the author describes how development programmes fail to link infrastructure provision and its necessary management requirements. Even when infrastructure is available, there is an absence of a market or coordinating mechanism for use of resources such as water, nutrients or biosolids. The paper discusses research needs to link urban sanitation management to cities' economic development agenda.

The Right to Water & Sanitation

2010-07-27T23:31:00.000+03:00

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the USSR and founder of Green Cross International, published an op-ed in the New York Times about the ongoing efforts at the UN to recognize right to water and sanitation as a basic human right. It is exciting to see water and sanitation issues take center stage at world forums not just as an important issue but as a essential human right. As Mr. Gorbachev says, this is indeed a great achievement. 190 countries have signed on, yet, countries like Canada and United States have refused to come on board.

A Sea of Roses

2010-07-25T19:53:00.002+03:00

One of the primary revenue streams for Sanergy is the high-quality organic fertilizer we will generate from the waste collected. We are particularly interested in contracting with commercial farms for our potentially large quantities of fertilizers.

Roses as far as the eye can see

Today, I spent they day at Karaturi Rose Farms, one of the biggest commercial farms in Kenya, with about 500 acres under cultivation on the shores of Lake Naivasha. Each day, they export nearly 1 million roses to Europe accounting for about 6.5% of global rose production. Using a combination of greenhouse and open field production techniques, they grow 26 varieties of roses throughout the year. Their streamlined process moves a rose stem from harvesting to grading to packing to shipping in less than 24 hours and delivers it to Amsterdam in less than 36 hours.

Vermicomposting and regular composting in action

Karaturi piqued my interest, in part, because of their focus on social welfare and environmental impact. They have nursery, primary, and secondary schools that are free of charge for the families of their 5,000 workers. They also provide a free 40-bed hospital that is open to the community. Recently, they have enhanced their efforts to reduce their carbon footprint (and consequently cut costs) through renewable energy and organic fertilizers. In this vein, they have started piloting vermicomposting as well as regular composting.

In another effort, they're connecting the 26 septic tanks from their workers' housing blocks to a biogas facility that will generate electricity for the farm. They estimate about 4 tons of waste is pumped from their septic tanks each each day, with about 1 - 2 tons usable in generating about 1000 cubic meters of biogas each day. Once installed, it will be one of the largest biogas generation facilities in Kenya.

Even with all these greening efforts, they anticipate that the waste products from their farms will meet only about 20% of their fertilizer and renewable energy needs. Clearly, Kenyan commercial farms hold a vast and unserviced need for organic fertilizer and energy. This is the market we, at Sanergy, look forward to tapping into.

Mr. Muscle to the Rescue

2010-07-23T22:05:00.000+03:00

As much as we focus on the technical challenges of building toilets, the real battle is the maintenance. In Kibera, 65% of the toilets are not operational because the pits are full and there is no means to empty it or because the toilets are broken and nobody has the responsibility to fix them. But even more often, residents can't use the toilets because of the seemingly simple problem of keeping them clean.

This morning I shadowed a team from Community Cleaning Services (CCS), a for-profit subsidiary of SC Johnson, which is trying to tackle exactly this problem one toilet at a time. Justin DeKozmovsky, who spearheads the BOP iniatives at SC Johnson, founded CCS 2 years ago and has been vital to its continued growth. Each team operates as an independent franchise responsible for securing their own clients but receiving training and supplies from CCS headquarters.

The first set of toilets we cleaned in the Kawangware slum are a classic example: 45 families, each consisting of 4-5 members, share three toilets. The landlord originally built the toilets but the maintenance is left to the tenants. The latrines are designed to be pour-flush and supposedly connect to the sewer, although the waste was actually flowing into an open pit outside. However, there was no water available to flush the waste, and the pipes taking the waste away were too small and frequently clog. Newspapers used as toilet paper and plastic bag flying toilets exacerbate the clogging issues. In just the 3 days since the last visit by the CCS team, the feces had overflowed the squat pan and collected all the way to the door.

Before the cleaning

Armed with scrubbers, mops, and SC Johnson's own Toilet Duck and Mr. Muscle, the brave CCS team dove right in. In just 45 minutes they uncloggeed, cleaned, and disinfected all three toilets. For just 25Ksh (~$0.30) in materials, the bowls were left sparking clean! I will spare you the videos of the cleaning, but the pictures speak for themselves.

After the cleaning

At Sanergy, our focus is on cleanliness because a clean toilet is a useable toilet. A lot of thought has gone into the design to achieve both perceived cleanliness and actual cleanliness. But to make it all useful, we also need good products, procedures, and training. Our partnership with CCS will provide us with exactly this. CCS will help train our toilet operators on cleaning processes and procedures and we will be using SC Johnson products to keep our toilets clean and fresh. We look forward to working closely with Justin, Mambo and the rest of the CCS crew.

A Sanergistic Team!

2010-07-22T21:18:00.003+03:00

When Sanergy was last in Nairobi, our team rolled three men deep: Dave Auerbach, Jeff Zira, and I. Over the past several months, though, our ranks have grown.

During May and June, we began the pilot’s design work from Cambridge. Both Chris Tolles, a designer and recent RISD graduate, and Nathan Cooke, a mechanical engineer and employee at MIT’s D-Lab, played key roles in drafting the first prototypes for the sanitation center we’ll be building this summer.

To finish the designing, building, and implementation on the ground, I’m joined in Nairobi by Ella Peinovich and Joel Veenstra - both of whom were clearly long destined to join the Sanergy team.

Although Ella’s architectural expertise, honed through work at Skidmore, Owing, & Merrill LLP (SOM) and her current course of study as a Master of Architecture (MArch) Candidate at MIT, have already proven extremely beneficial, her true qualification for membership in Team Sanergy lies in her musician father’s original song “Music in the Outhouse” and his hobby of collecting miniature outhouses.

With a passion for optimizing user experience through appropriate design and for working in developing countries, Ella is enthusiastic about building her own outhouse. Moreover, as a LEED AP, Ella is deeply interested in sustainable design that encompasses both “green” and community-based practices. Sanergy offers her the opportunity to dive into the details of product design and see the real-life impact of her late nights of drawing, measuring, redrawing, and building.

Joel Veenstra

The fates, with a little help from a friend’s forwarded email, also very clearly intended for Joel to join Sanergy. A blond-haired, blue-eyed Canadian who grew up in Tanzania and attended high school in Kenya, Joel has surprised many a Jua Kali metal worker with his fluent Swahili and the construction savvy he’s developed through summer jobs building houses and repairing foundations.

Like Ella, Joel wants to continue working in developing countries after graduation. In particular, he’s interested in water resource management – providing clean, accessible water to communities that lack it. Team Sanergy, though, couldn’t be more excited to have him on board our own waterless sanitation endeavor.

Our Summer Pilot

2010-07-19T20:45:00.002+03:00

Sanergy aims to build and scale viable sanitation infrastructure in the slums throughout Kenya, Africa, and the developing world. We will create a network of franchised low-cost sanitation centers, collect the waste from these centers, and process it into electricity and fertilizer at our central processing facility. But that’s the very long term.

This summer, our goals are bit more modest but, as we’re discovering, no less challenging: Build two sanitation centers in Nairobi’s slums, work out the operational kinks on the collection route for each center, and process the waste by applying a urea solution to it.

Step 1: Create a comprehensive design for a low-cost, small-footprint sanitation center adapted to local conditions and user preference. No problem, right? To aid the design process, we’ve supplemented MIT’s mens et manus with some hands-on training in ferrocement in Nicaragua’s EcoTec.

Step 2: Work with a community group to identify two pilot sites. Done and done. We’re thrilled that, through partnership Carolina for Kibera, we’ll be building in Soweto West and, through Bridge International Academies, we’ll be building in Lunga Lunga.

Step 3: Build the sanitation centers. From local materials and unskilled labor. This challenge has led us to develop an intense relationship wiith the city’s industrial areas along Mombasa Road and the informal markets at Gikomba and Jua Kali.

Step 4: Identify operators to run the sanitation centers, collection routes and processing sites. We’ve begun conversation through our community partners and hope to have our first operators confirmed soon.

Step 5: Establish standard operating procedures. This week, we’ll be learning from cleaning experts SC Johnson, apprenticing with their subsidiary Community Cleaning Services. Once we’ve completed construction of our sanitation centers, we’ll begin training the operators in a thorough yet efficient system that will deliver the best user experience possible.

Of course, this is only the beginning. Through the end of the year, we’ll be gathering user feedback to revise the design and operating procedures for the next phase. Before we’re ready for feedback and revisions, though, we still have an adventurous summer ahead.

We're baaack!

2010-07-17T22:52:00.000+03:00

It's been 4 months since our last post, but Sanergy is back in force in Kenya. In fact, we have been here since June 25. A lot has happened and we have made significant progress. Over the next few posts/days, I will try to do some catchup on what we have been doing and what we have planned for the rest of the summer.

Vote for us in the Dell Social innovation competition

2010-02-14T01:28:00.000+03:00

Hey all, if you've got a minte, please click here (http://bit.ly/bbAcOh) and give us a quick vote. Looks like we're moving up quickly!

Matatu madness

2010-02-02T23:41:00.001+03:00

Matatus are the private vans/buses that operate on the same routes as some of the city buses, but are generally smaller and with more character. Some operators claim to want to attract the younger crowd, and paint the buses with crazy murals/decorations, and pimp out the insides with crazy lighting and expensive sound systems (some even have video). Riding in one of the crazy ones is a true Nairobi experience (although probably not unique to the city)

Here are some of the better ones we spotted:

dirty trix

ace hood?

the obama van, by faith (this type of van/bus is the most common type. usually a nissan that they manage to squeeze about 15 people into)

not actually a matatu, but still very cool

crunk ain't dead!

tha dogg pound

shawty

the unda dawg

(click on the image and zoom in to see the new facebook logo)

(jay z)

prison break
g unit
not a matatu, but funny company name: ape auto
also not a matatu. but who isn't a fan of maximizing their miracles?

The study of the hustle

talk of the town

roll of the dice (gambler)

what beef?

carter??
what does the red part say?

a praise van

some pop/rb something person

even the pushcarts...

The beginning of the end

2010-02-02T07:42:00.000+03:00

We set aside the final week of our trip with two primary objectives in mind: understand the financing piece of our model, and understand our users' needs.

We jumped right into work on Monday after arriving at 5:30am from Mombasa (coastal city) on the bus. We were a bit uneasy knowing that Eric was robbed in the same spot coming from the same place. Still, we got back to our hostel and prepped to go out and meet some of our users.

We met up with Emery from SuSan design, and we headed over to Umande (the org we met with during the first week). At that point, I thought that the lack of sleep from the bus ride was catching up with me, as I wasn't feeling so great. We arrived at Umande only to find that they weren't willing to have us meet their users, and a fairly awkward conversation ensued. I think that Emery's presence confused Umande and made them uneasy. Eventually we cleared the misunderstanding (it wasn't a good day because there was an evaluation happening at the same time). By the end everyone was in good spirit, but I was feeling exceptionally cold and sat in the sun with 3 layers on.

I continued to feel worse, so Ani and I headed back to the hostel where I talked to the owner, who suggested it might be malaria given my symptoms (I also had a fever and minor diarrhea over the weekend [hey, nothing is off-limits in a blog about sanitation in the slums!]). Ani grabbed me a malaria test kit, which turned up negative, and the owner (a registered nurse) said it was probably an amoeba, and suggested I take metronidazole.

I ended up sleeping most of the day, alternating between feeling extremely cold and sweating until my clothes were drenched. I woke up the next day feeling a bit better, so I decided to go along on the field visit to Mathare, where Ecotact's lone slum toilet is located.

We talked to both users and non-users of the toilets to learn more about their underlying needs pertaining to sanitation. Some key observations were:

materials are of key importance: although "iron sheets" are sufficient to make sturdy walls, concrete structures signal permanence and that the toilet is there to stay.
residents often prefer toilets operated by organizations rather than government or individuals
more lighting in the surrounding areas may drive more people to use toilets instead of "the bush"
the police can be helpful: when they catch people defecating in the open, they bring them to the IkoToilet to let them know it's there if they want to use it
people tend to use the showers more during the middle of the day, and the toilets at the beginning and end.
politics can be influential: some people hate the local politician who endorses the Iko Toilet, and refuse to use it
showers (at the toilets) solve the lack of privacy at home when trying to find a place/time to shower (houses are usually one-room, and showers are bucket style, with water draining to the mud drainage ditches outside)
most people don't want to go in the bush (it's a pride issue)

After our visit, I still wasn't feeling good, so we headed to Nairobi hospital for a checkup. I met with a doctor who ordered some tests, including malaria, stool microscopy, and a blood count. We waited for a while, and the results were ready around 9pm: no malaria, no amoeba, no typhoid. Looking at some of the blood numbers, the problem was probably an intestinal virus and should be self limiting. I got some probiotics and slept.

The next morning I felt significantly better, so I went along on the visit to Equity Bank. Equity is a large commercial bank that started offering microfinance services about two years ago. We met with a couple of impressive, fast-talking Kenyans who helped us understand how Equity is relevant to our project. Our key take-aways were:

there is no lower limit for loans at Equity
clients should have collateral with value of 5x the loan amount (!)
Equity does microfranchising on a case-by-case basis

The last point is probably the most important to us: we want to have small toilet units purchased and operated by individuals that can be paid for with financing from microfinance banks. Given that the banks are willing to look at microfranchising proposals case-by-case tells us that we have to make sure our concept is up-and-running and shows good numbers before we can reach out to that channel for funding. Still, it's a big positive to know that it's possible

We spent the rest of the day catching up on email, and had some delicious Ethiopian food for less than $2.50 a person.

On Thursday, we had some time in the morning, so we went on a run. My stomach may not have been fixed yet, which led to a sprint to the bathroom at the end.

We then headed to our second user interview session, this time in Kibera with Umande. We again met with users and non-users, and had the following new learnings:

open defecation is a pride issue (and men supposedly have a difficult time admitting to it)
The need for showers is not universal
people will sometimes destroy/vandalize toilets out of jealousy
awareness campaigns are very effective at convincing people that open defecation is shameful, and work well when coupled with a new toilet center opening
users are afraid that lower fees mean worse service/cleanliness at toilets

The day finished with a bit of Africa cup semifinals and a lukewarm beer.

Work until you pass out

2010-02-01T07:35:00.000+03:00

The second half of the week was just as busy as the first.

On Wednesday morning, we met with Japeth from the Water and Sanitation Program (WSP) at the World Bank. The Bank is located in Upper Hill, amongst many large corporation and NGO headquarters, and was a humble 4-5 story brick building. We went inside (after a cursory security check -- I was nervous about the large fruit knife in my backpack, but they didn't actually check it), and headed to Japeth's office.

Japeth told us his view of the sanitation ecosystem, and explained the importance of working with the local government. He said that the WSP's role is primarily to coordinate the many players in the sanitation space, and to publish reports on sanitation in East Africa. He was happy to provide us with some (very dusty) copies of some of the reports they've produced recently, which we eagerly snatched up for later reference.

One of us thought that his finishing remarks were a bit blindly nationalistic, but I thought they weren't necessarily that emotionally charged. Basically, he mentioned that NGOs are usually against the work that the government does in sanitation, and complain that it's not up to standards. However, this is mostly because the more work the government does, the less work there is for the NGOs to do -- essentially, their raison d'etre is eroded the more the government accomplishes. My guess is that the truth is somewhere in between (the government does a sloppy job at times, but NGOs really are worried that need for their services is slowly declining)

We were scheduled to meet with a representative from the Ministry of Agriculture, but the meeting was cancelled as we were about to step into a taxi, so we walked the hot, dusty streets in our formal wear in a search for lunch.

After lunch, we headed to meet with Henry from Technoserve. He was very helpful in sharing his thoughts on both sanitation and the fertilizer markets. He gave us several good contacts in each area, and sent us on our way with plenty of concrete next steps. On our way out, we met wtih the director of Technoserve Kenya who was very interested in biogas and sanitation, and recommended a few more people to meet with us. The only reason we were able to meet him was because I wanted to stick around and take advantage of the first wireless I found in Kenya to make a Skype call to my dad.

That evening we met up with Maia, a Kiva Fellow on her way to Ghana, as well as the other fellows. We had some amazing Indian food, rivaling the best that you can get in the states, and then headed to a bar, which just happened to have Karaoke every other Wednesday night. What luck! Needless to say, we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly (see the rapping gangstars below) and were amused at the Kenyan penchant for 80s love songs and 90s alternative.

Thursday morning we met with Suraj, an Acumen fellow and all-around amazing guy. Suraj is currently working with Peepoople (name explained in a minute), and recently finished some consulting work with Ecotact. Peepoople is an organization started by a Swedish architect that is trying to make flying toilets safer by eliminating pathogens inside. Flying toilets are a phenomenon mostly seen in crowded settlements without proper sewer systems: someone defecates in a plastic bag or on a piece of paper and then throws it outside (maybe in a trash heap or a nearby drainage ditch). Peepoople has developed a bag that eliminates all pathogens using a small urea packet, with the aim of improving the health of the residents without needing to alter their behavior.

Suraj let us know about all the difficulties of working on the Peepoople project, and gave us the inside scoop on Ecotact's toilets in the Mathare slum (my understanding: it's not working anywhere near as well as they would like). We could have talked for hours with him (and probably should have), but we had another meeting scheduled, and had to take off.

We headed over to a nearby business complex, where we met with Tom, the founder of Climate Care (now known as JP Morgan Climate Care). Climate care is an organization that deals in carbon credits and CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) projects. They've been very successful in their field (thus the buyout by JP Morgan), and Tom definitely knew what he was doing. Tom explained the basics of the carbon credit program (scolding us once for not having read the website before coming -- but hey, what do you expect when we have such limited internet?), and went into detail about the difficulties of working with all the different stakeholders. My final takeaway was that for a project of our size, there is absolutely no point in looking at carbon credits as a revenue source. We'd be in a much better position to take advantage of the credits if we were a large, established organization saving over 15M tons of carbon a year.

Without time for lunch, we then headed out to join a UNICEF conference on clean water. We took a matatu (Kenyan crazy bus with too many people and loud music) to the US Embassy area. We weren't sure of the exact location, but we figured we could find the place by asking around. Unfortunately for us, everyone gave us different instructions, and we wandered up and down the hilly UN/US Embassy area in the hot sun (in our dress clothes) with little success. After about an hour of walking, we found a tour operator who knew the place, and offered to take us there for a couple dollars.

(can you see the name on this one? "Like a pimp")

We arrived at the Lord Errol restaurant (Ani commented that it looked someone thought the colonial period wasn't over), and found the conference room, where someone was finishin up a presentation on their technology. In a very fortunate turn of events, they broke for lunch and said that they had a few cancellations, so we could eat too. It was perfect given that we were starving and thought we'd have to wait until the end to get some food. We talked to a few guests, and met a young guy working on a chlorine dispenser project we heard about back at MIT. The passionfruit juice was amazing, and the lunch was great.

After lunch, I found myself dozing off to less-than-excellent presentations by people working for various NGOs in the clean water space in Kenya. There were only 3 non-Kenyans, and one left early. Although the content itself was fairly straightforward, we learned a lot about the inefficiencies of Kenyan meetings. Some of the stranger things they did included asking all the questions first, then allowing everyone to answer in turn, and speaking to the room in barely audible voices. Some of the powerpoint presentations with their crazy animations were downright hilarious, and the speech from the Minister was one of the most awful, self-promoting and empty pieces of rhetoric I've heard (he then promptly left to go do something "important")

(sorry for the low quality -- this camera is on its last legs)

We managed to escape the meeting early and got a ride with one of the ladies from a solar water cooking company. We then packed our bags, had a quick dinner, and hopped on the night bus to Mombasa to stay at the orphanage where Dave's mom currently works. I was so exhausted I fell asleep and only woke up when the cops stopped the bus and did an ID check on all the passengers.

Stories about the weekend in Mombasa will have to wait for another time, but to sum it up: it was hot, I got sick, the girls at the orphanage were a rambunctious but lovable bunch, and snorkeling helped ease my ailing stomach.

Meetings, meetings, meetings

2010-01-27T15:04:00.000+03:00

Sanergy had a really busy week last week. So busy in fact, that I didn't have time to write any updates, so this will all come in one big lump.

Monday was a very interesting day. We headed over to the favored meeting spot for all "cool" expats: the yaya center. There we met Joseph, an independent consultant who told us about Carolina for Kibera before we headed to Kibera to see some of their work firsthand. CFK (for short) was started by the University of North Carolina, and is one of the most respected NGOs in the Kibera community (by the people, which is of key importance). They like to play the role of the enabler; rather than start and build their own projects, they help support projects already underway in the community by getting funding, or by introducing proven ideas/projects to youth groups in the community looking for work to do.

When we arrived at Kibera, we stopped near a wall painted bright pink where a few young guys were washing a car. Behind the pink wall was a shack, which is the office of the youth group "Zulu." We met with their leaders and Medina from CFK. Zulu formed many years ago (20?) as one of the many soccer clubs in Kibera (around 60 for a population of 800,000 in the slum). The boys wanted other ways to earn money to support their team, so they started a car wash. They take turns manning the station, and can earn a few dollars a week (in total) doing it. They later started a trash collection service, where families pay about 20KSH (25c) per bag of trash. They then collect the trash in a trash dump they cleared by the side of the main road, and sort it into compostable, plastic, electronic, glass, and metal. They plan on selling the recyclables at some point, but they're waiting for a buyer to come. The remaining trash is put in bags and is collected once a month.

Most recently, they've taken an interest in the Umande biocenters, which are tall, circular buildings that have toilets on the ground floor, and community space on top. Below, all the human waste produced is collected, where it naturally produces biogas (a mix of methane and co2). The gas is piped upstairs to the community space, where it is burned in normal stove burners to heat water or food. The umande centers have been successful in gathering about 3-600 users per center, and generate a small profit each month.

The Zulu group wants CFK to help them get funding to build their own center that they can operate for the neighborhood. People would then have a clean place to go to the bathroom, and Zulu would have another income source.

We said our goodbyes to Zulu, Joseph, and CFK, and Dave noticed he had about 11 missed calls and messages. Apparently, Lindsay's friend's brother (Eric) arrived in Nairobi that morning from Mombasa via bus, and was forced into a taxi by two guys posing as taxi drivers. They hit and threatened him with clubs, took all of his belongings (wallet, passport, backpack), and then threw him out of the car. He rolled down a steep 20 foot drop, but managed to get up and make his way to the embassy. When we got the call, he was in the hospital getting x-rays and ct scans. He had no money and no cards to pay for anything, so we headed over there to meet him and help him out.

We wandered around the hospital for a bit, until I saw a guy I thought might be him and said "hey, are you Eric?" He was in good spirits, and didn't look too beat up at all. A couple of us headed out to use the net as he waited for his turn. We were in the Indian area of town, and I decided to get a haircut at an Indian guy's place. I was a bit surprised at one point when I looked up and saw that my hair looked exactly like his!

We then had an informal visit with some Technoserve consultants. All were great guys, and we had a fun time just chatting without a formal objective. We then took Eric back to our lodging (a shack with 2 bunk-beds in what looked like someone's backyard). Good thing we had an extra space for him!

And that was just Monday!

Tuesday was the first time we didn't have anything in the morning, so we took the opportunity to reorganize our things and do our laundry. No laundry machines means hand-washing. Housewives need to have strong forearms.

That afternoon, Ani and Dave met with CARE while I caught up with some work. We then had a quick bite to eat at Ani's new favorite restaurant, Mlindi Dishes. They serve coastal Kenyan food, which has an interesting resemblance to Indian cooking in certain ways.

We met up with a recent MIT alum, who's now working in Kenya at the IFC in the investment division. He told us all about his job, life in Kenya, and the other MIT grads he's seen around. Seems like all the ones he knows are doing very well (including himself!)

It was then time to head back to our favorite 6x10 ft smelly cabin with four guys and their dirty clothes.

I'll leave you in suspense concerning the happenings of W/Th

Mathare Slum visit

2010-01-19T18:55:00.000+03:00

Thursday was a very interesting day for Sanergy. My perspective changed significantly concerning the reality of pay toilets in slums after our visit to the Ecotact (makers of the very successful urban pay-per-use toilet "Iko Toilet") unit in the Mathare slum.

The unit there is operated very differently from the units in downtown Nairobi. Some key differences:

Payment: the slum unit accepts payment on a per-family basis, and only costs 100 shillings for a membership per month; the urban units are only pay-per-use and cost 5 shillings
Location: the units downtown are generally in prime, high-traffic areas (because the city authorities are leasing the land to Ecotact there); in Mathare, the unit is hemmed in on all four sides by mud and corrugated tin houses, and sees little foot traffic (at least during our visit)
Ownership/operators: The units in the city are managed professionally by Ecotact; the unit in the slum is operated by a youth group called River Jam (more on them later)
Profitability: while the units downtown are bustling places of business (with people not only using the toilets but buying drinks or getting shoe shines), only one user visited the Mathare unit during our 30 minute visit. Ecotact describes this situation as "the profitable units subsidising the slum unit"
Quality: the Mathare unit's ceilings were falling in, there was no music, and the men's urinals were replaced by a metal sheet with a curved bottom that sloped to a drain.

However, I want to point out that none of these aspects are necessarily "bad." They merely illustrate some of the differences when trying something downtown versus trying something in the slums. It was interesting that the architecture was exactly the same as the units downtown. The quality of the facilities were probably better than that of Umande, which has over 30 units in slums around Nairobi.

Still, I think that simply transplanting the same facilities from busy urban streets to the slums is not going to work in the long run. If the slum units are to be profitable, costs must be cut drastically to match the lower revenues achievable in the slums (by some estimates 10,000 KSH per month vs. 750,000 per month downtown). The young men who operated the unit showed us their entrepreneurial spirit in the multitude of side businesses they set up around the toilets: homemade ice-pops out of an old freezer, a hair salon out back, a store (which they closed), and a water-selling business. Still, revenues come nowhere close to the units in the city, which left me with a lot of doubts concerning the scalability of the transplanted Ecotact model in the slums.

After visiting the Iko Toilet, we went to check out some of the other work by the River Jam youth group. Youth groups are a common phenomenon in the slums: groups of up to around 25 young boys will form a group around an activity (soccer, etc) or business (trash collection, toilet operation, etc.). The groups tend to have boys who pride themselves on doing positive things for the communities; some mentioned that "other" boys laugh at them and then head to the downtown area to snatch purses and shoplift.

We walked down to River Jam's garden by the filthy Mathare river which splits the slum in two sections. I was overwhelmed at the positivity this group was trying to bring under such visibly dire circumstances. They cleared land that was once a massive trash dump (trash is not collected by the city in the slums, so it usually piles up somewhere), and turned it into a beautiful garden with corn, beans, squash and a pig pen. The contrast with the other side of the river was dramatic -- pigs wandered aimlessly through a stinking mound of garbage looking for food.

The boys themselves were very welcoming and told us all about their activities, and were evidently proud of the work they do. I couldn't contain my awe at their dedication to improving the slum they live in. It was just not something I expected to find. To be honest, I was more inspired by the work they did than people who have accomplished amazing things but were raised in environments conducive to success. All odds were against these boys (AIDS, drugs, gangs, illness), but they not only persevered, but actually made a powerful contribution to their community.

This post is dedicated to their achievements.

-jeff

Rapid learning

2010-01-14T18:11:00.000+03:00

We had a couple more busy days in Nairobi. Amazing what good use you make of time when you’re aware that it’s limited (I used the word “aware” intentionally -- our time is always limited, we just pretend that it isn’t so that fear of the distant future doesn’t paralyze us)
Tuesday:

Running -- Dave, Ani, and I caused a scene when the three of us ran through streets of Nairobi few foreigners have ever been. We got a couple of shouts, and one guy pretended to run with us.
Emery -- Met with a Congolese guy who seemed to be a jack-of-all-trades: he was a translator, did work in sanitation, and had a business of some sort. He was very helpful for getting further connections, but his interest in any one thing seemed to be somewhat shallow.
Had lunch at an authentic downtown Nairobi restaurant: Highlands grill. Apparently it’s one of Judy’s favorites. Definitely the only foreigners in the restaurant. Had a bunch of interesting bean dishes, some potato things, some kale, and a bitter vegetable called namasaka.
Judy – Met with a staff member of Ecotact (Acumen, etc. funded toilet company) who gave us tours of a couple of toilets downtown. The units were square cement structures with 3 stalls and 3 urinals, and one shower (on the men’s side). It cost 5 Shillings to enter (7 cents), and the busier units typically see about 5000 customers per day. There were a total of 6 tanks holding 1000L of water in case of water shortages. A busy unit (5000 customers per day) would use about 3000L of water. The music playing inside was a nice touch. There were also shoe-shining stalls out back where another company leased the space to set up their business.
Wandering -- we then left and wandered through the city aimlessly, stopping at bus stop, book store, fruit stand, and American Hilton (which had a metal detector that everyone set off, but none of the security guards ever reacted to it)
Beer -- we found a place called Simmers with live music (Congolese? Kenyans playing Latin music?) and grabbed some Kenyan beers and watched the people interact. There were suspiciously large numbers of single women wearing (relatively) provocative clothing and throwing glances around. Hmm…. nightlife indeed

Wednesday:

Vimala (MIT) came in early in the morning and traveled around with us to a couple of meetings throughout the day. Impressive that she was able to stay awake…
Justin -- a really cool post-MBA working for SC Johnson to make a toilet cleaning service using their products. He spent about 3 years setting up the program (2.5 abroad, 0.5 in Kenya), and has gotten it to the point where he can recruit motivated entrepreneurs from the slums to start cleaning service businesses. A very revealing meeting that told us a lot about doing business in Kenya.
Lunch in weird mall -- we met Justin in a strange mall that felt oddly like America with the multi-ethnic mix of customers. We ordered food from the food court, which despite the appearance, was anything but fast food. Indian food was tasty, but may have caused some gastro-intestinal distress.
Jackson -- met with Jackson of the Clinton Foundation, who sat patiently with us for two hours in a room that gradually rose in temperature explaining extremely useful details about various markets and businesses in Kenya.
Another mall -- we then headed to another mall to meet up with a couple of recently returned young Kenyans who were starting a consulting business. They offered to help us out with our pilot. They seemed like really cool guys, and I think we’ll hang out on Tuesday night.
MIT people -- leaving the bathroom we ran into a couple people working in the MIT mobility lab. One recognized me from the Kiva meeting last month.
Dinner adventure – we then drove around for what felt like 2 hours looking for a restaurant. Finally found one, but barely any veggie options. I felt pretty bad for some reason and fell asleep.
More police -- we had a more serious run in with the cops. Our driver Edwin made the mistake of heading down the same road as Monday, but this time with 4 people in the back seat. We got waved to the side by the cops, who were excited in that “well lookey what we have here”-type voice. They proceeded to BS us with the law and how serious our infraction was and that they were going to take us to jail for the night. We got a bit nervous when our driver wasn’t able to pull the “tribe card” again, and more cops began to emerge from nowhere (with AK47s) to circle around the fresh kill like sharks. Ani and Dave got a bit agitated and a bit antagonistic, which didn’t help the situation considering that the cops were just looking for an excuse to go on a power trip and threaten us some more. Edwin, our driver, got out of the car (never do that in the US!) to try to smooth talk them. He was back there for some time, and in the meantime, one of the cops attempted to extort 2000KSH ($25) each from the 4 people in the back row. We said no way, but had to wait about 15 minutes before Edwin finally negotiated a bribe of 1200KSH ($15) total. Not a pleasant experience, and we ended up not going to the party we wanted to go to. Eh, life is still wonderful

My feelings at the end of the day are that there is definitely a need for the sanitation services we want to provide, and that there is clearly a market for the outputs we aim to generate from the waste, but the big questions that remain are:

Execution (will we be able to commit the time in-country to get it done? Is it possible given the various constraints?)
Scale (is there really enough energy content in the waste to support rapid scaling? Is it even possible to scale rapidly in these types of environments?)
Profitability (will we really be able to generate the revenues we claim we should be able to?)

Tomorrow looks to be another exciting day -- we’ll be visiting Mathare settlement (slum) to see how IkoToilet differs between urban and slum areas.

Also, free housing with locals has resulted in the following sleeping situation:

(hey, it beats wasting grant money!)

First Day!

2010-01-13T17:44:00.000+03:00

We had an action-packed first day in Kenya!

Last night we arrived at around 8, and had to deal with some luggage that didn’t make the connection in Amsterdam because of the snow. We went to Dave’s mom’s friend’s place, where we received a warm Kenyan welcome with delicious food (which we ate even though we had what seemed like seven meals on the flights). We then slept comfortably (3 to a small queen size mattress on the floor) and I got bit by a bunch of mosquitoes.

I went for a run in the morning with Daniel, a quiet Kenyan who is the adopted brother of our host. I really enjoyed running in a developing country where people don’t think you’re crazy for running. I did get some great shouts though, including “hey muzungu” (foreigner), “Chinese!” and “hai-yo-hai-yo.”

We then met with David Kuria, an entrepreneur operating pay-per-use public toilets. It seems like he’s got quite a good business model (especially judging by the fancy Benz in his parking lot). He’s received a lot of awards for the work he’s done to bring sanitation to Kenya, and it seems like he’s only just getting started.

Our driver Edwin took us to a great restaurant downtown, where I we had some delicious western Kenyan food. We then rushed over to Kibera, where things started looking a bit more like Cambodia: houses/huts with basic building materials like sticks and corrugated tin, trash in big mounds, and small shops selling a variety of colorful items.

We met with Josiah and his team, which is attempting to solve key sanitation issues through a grassroots, slum-dweller led effort. Six of eight (Josiah included) were born and raised in the slums, and gave us an inspiring view of what’s possible when people put their minds to something. They’ve built 36 sanitation centers in the sprawling Kibera slum (which is better thought of as a rust-hued city of tin, sticks, and mud), with most having built-in biogas digesters that channel the gas into a separate cooking room where slum-dwellers pay a small fee to cook their food. The units were impressive concrete cylindrical structures, usually about 30ft in diameter and 40ft tall, and cost around $25k each to build. It’s hard to explain how impressive both the organization and the genuineness of the people were.

(the guys and the biocenter)

As we trekked through the red mud, plastic bags, filthy streams, and shoddy houses, kids popped out to say hello to the muzungus. They love to say “how are you” and try to shake your hand. So cute. Some started shouting “Chinese” at me, and one decided that I was Bruce Lee, and then called a group of 10 of his closest buddies over and started shouting “Brrrrruce Lee!” The guys from Josiah’s organization decided that would be my new name

(walking the "settlements")

We then left and met up with a couple of Kiva fellows living in Nairobi (Avani and Hanna) for some amazing Ethiopian food. No doubt the best I ever had. We then headed over and met Dave’s friend from the Acumen Fund, and chatted until about 10.

As we went to drop off Hanna, we got stopped at a police checkpoint in the dark by two cops holding AK-47s. They shined the light in the car and saw that Ani didn’t have a seatbelt on, and started very seriously telling him to get out of the car. Our driver Edwin stayed cool though and started talking in Swahili with the cop. He casually got out of the car as the cop continued to tell Ani to get out, and continued to talk to him. They chatted some more, and the tension visibly eased. Edwin then got back in the car, and the cop welcomed us to Kenya and wished us a good trip. We had no idea what happened, but as we drove off, Edwin told us that the cop was his tribesman, and that they came from the same home town. Tribalism, usually scorned as one of the major causes of corruption, definitely came in handy!

All in all, it was an amazing day, with tons learned and many friends made. Looking forward to tomorrow!