GOOD WORKS
‘So We Had This Idea’ Hydropower and Canadian technology are combining to change lives in Nepal. Could the ideas put into play by a pair of University of Calgary professors and APEGA Members go worldwide?
A development project to improve the health of Nepalese villagers escaped recent earth- quakes unscathed. Led by University of Calgary professors Ed Nowicki, P.Eng., PhD, FEC, FGC (Hon.), and David Wood, P.Eng., work had wrapped up on the two-year project just a few months before the quakes struck. Latrines had been dug, greenhouses built. LED lights were supplied. Energy-efficient wood stoves, water filters, water tanks, and electrical control systems were installed. Today, the new infrastructure remains in place, helping residents of the remote rural community of Ghodasin improve sanitation and grow their own food. And by tapping into small-scale hydropower systems that already existed, 50 homes are now using clean en- ergy to boil drinking water and cook, instead of producing toxic smoke by burning resin- ous wood. Previously, electricity was mainly used in homes for compact florescent lamps, radios, TVs, and cell phones. Dr. Nowicki, an associate professor in electrical and computer engineering at the U of C’s Schulich School of Engineering, is a past recipient of the APEGA Excellence in Education Summit Award. He explains the situation this way: “Water flow for hydro sys- tems in these villages tends to be fairly reli- able, but the power is not used all day long. In fact, it’s wasted on purpose so the turbine and generator can be regulated and run at a fairly constant speed. So we had this idea: Why not use the excess power, which would other- wise be wasted, in the powerhouse? Let’s send that power to the homes so they can use it to heat water for drinking and cleaning.” A $100,000 Grand Challenges Canada Stars in Global Health grant helped launch the project. The grant program supports initiatives that help improve rural health in developing countries. When the funding was awarded in April 2013, work quickly began on the technical part of the project — the devel- opment of a Distributed Electronic Load Con- troller (DELC). The device measures electrical
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