Solar-Powered Camels Carry Medicine Across Harsh Deserts

Solar-powered camels? Well, the camels themselves are not solar-powered any more than natural selection has deemed them to be. However, camels and solar power are teaming up to deliver much-needed medicines to rural nomads in Kenya.

For years, the Nomadic Communities Trust has been using camels as mobile medicine clinics to ensure residents of Kenya’s harsh, remote Samburu and Laikipia districts receive as much health care as possible. Until now, those clinics could not provide vaccines and other medicines that require refrigeration because of the long treks over hot and rough terrain. But in 2005, the NCT partnered with Designmatters, a program of the Art Center College of Design in California, and the Princeton Institute for the Science and Technology of Materials (PRISM) to build solar-powered refrigerators that could be carried by camels over long distances.

The fruits of that collaboration are now being enjoyed in Kenya, as the first solar-powered camels make their arduous treks to serve their nomadic patients. The mobile clinics were built on a budget of less than $2,000, so economy was of the utmost importance. The finished product is a mini-fridge in a primarily bamboo saddle with a crystalline solar panel roof. The panel provides enough power for refrigeration and lighting as the camel carries medicines invaluable to local residents. In just the Samburu and Laikipia districts, there are about 300,000 people living without access to medicine, which at this time, can only be delivered intact by solar-powered camels.

The Nomadic Communities Trust and its partners point out that their simple technology can be adopted anywhere in the world where with access to camels. As the first solar-powered camel trips are tested in Kenya and Ethiopia, the group hopes to solicit enough funding to ramp up the program in 2010 and potentially spread the concept elsewhere.

Source and Photo: Inhabitat

Posted on December 10th in Solar News by Dan.