Books We Love :: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

William Kamkwamba on Jon Stewart
Jon Stewart sits down with William Kamkwamba who at the age of 14, rather than accept his fate, started borrowing books from a small community lending library located at his former primary school. He borrowed an 8th grade American textbook called Using Energy, which depicted wind turbines on its cover. He decided to build a windmill to power his family’s home and obviate the need for kerosene, which provided only smoky, flickering, distant and expensive light after dark.

First he built a prototype using a radio motor, then his initial 5-meter windmill out of a broken bicycle, tractor fan blade, old shock absorber, and blue gum trees. After hooking the windmill to a car battery for storage, William was able to power four light bulbs and charge neighbors’ mobile phones. This system was even equipped with homemade light switches and a circuit breaker made from nails, wire, and magnets. The windmill was later extended to 12 meters to better catch the wind above the trees. A third windmill pumped grey water for irrigation.

Subsequent projects have included clean water, malaria prevention, solar power and lighting for the six homes in his family compound; a deep water well with a solar powered pump for clean water, a drip irrigation system, and the outfitting of the village team Wimbe United with their first ever uniforms and shoes. Since receiving their sun and wind-themed uniforms, the team has been on a winning streak that has brought the village together with pride.

The windmill project drew many visitors from kilometers around, including Dr. Hartford Mchazime, Ph.D., the deputy director of the MTTA, the Malawian NGO responsible for the community library. Mchazime brought press, including The Malawi Daily Times, who wrote a long story. Soyapi Mumba and Mike McKay, engineers at Baobab Health Partnership in Malawi blogged about the article, and news of William’s inventions reached Emeka Okafor, program director for TEDGlobal, a prestigious gathering of thinkers and innovators. Okafor searched quite diligently to find William and invite him to the conference as a fellow. William’s presentation led to additional mentors, donors, and companies supporting his education and further projects.

You can learn more about William and his astonishing story of building a windmill in his home village in Malawi here. His book is storming the charts at Amazon here http://bit.ly/IDJgf (A special call-out to TED’s Tom Rielly @trielly who urged me to bring him to the stage at Arusha and who has since been supporting his education and much more. Also to @emeka_okafor who brought William to Arusha as a TED Fellow.)

William Kamkwamba at TED

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 8th, 2009 at 9:58 AM and is filed under FWL BLOG and tagged with africa, books, Books We Love, com, Jon Stewart, ted, the boy who harnessed the wind, using energy, William Kamkwamba, windmill. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.