A group of postgraduate students from the School of Engineering have recently returned from a week-long visit to the island of Zanzibar where they met with KIST University students and staff, local produce manufacturers and officials from the Fisheries Department to present their solar powered chiller system, which is being developed as part of their Engineering Capstone project.
The 5 students are part of a larger team lead by Dr Amanda Hughes that over the past 2 years have designed and built a large cold storage facility converted from a cargo container powered by solar energy. The project is called Solar Chiller and a prototype has been constructed at Ness Gardens.
The open-sourced design was presented to the students and staff at KIST, and in September they will start to build their own version of the chiller in Zanzibar for continued testing before the design is released into the community.
One example of the Solar Chillers potential can be seen in preventing food waste on the island. Currently up to 50% of the tomatoes grown on Zanzibar can end up being discarded due to the lack of available cold storage. The price of tomatoes also plummets during this time as there is an abundance of the crop with everyone trying to sell simultaneously before the produce goes off. At present the system is capable of cooling to 4 degrees which will increase the shelf life of the crop by up to 3 weeks.
Following a meeting with officials from the Fisheries Department during the visit, the next iteration will aim to run at -6 allowing the chiller to store the abundance of seafood that is present on Zanzibar, to aid with the blue economy scheme currently being implemented by their government.
Mechanical Engineering student Nicole Martin-Ford said, “This has been an incredible experience, over the past week we have met with some amazing people, as well as working with KIST we have met with Barefoot College Zanzibar which provides educational opportunities for rural women with little access to resources.
Steven Bode, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering said “This is an extraordinary group of students that have accomplished something remarkable. Their professionalism, teamwork, and commitment to excellence has made a lasting impression on everyone they have met here, further solidifying our reputation of producing exceptional Masters students.”