Comet-ME is a responsible social-environmental-engineering initiative.
We build renewable energy systems for communities that are not connected to the electricity grid because of political reasons and build local capacity to install and maintain those systems. The provision of renewable energy to off-grid communities answers a social, economic and environmental need. This is by no means a luxury issue but rather a matter of life-support in a particularly harsh situation.
Our goals
The project has two overarching goals:- The social and economic empowerment of the target communities through material support.
- Environmental sustainability.
Hybrid wind and solar electricity generating system
In engineering terms we build two types of systems: basic family system and bigger community utility centres.
The first are pure solar systems with a 0.5 to 1 kWh/day capacity and provide enough energy for several light bulbs, cell phone recharging (an absolute necessity in the region) and several hours of radio use. Each system includes the solar panel(s), an electricity box with a charge controller, deep cycle battery, small inverter, all the necessary electric safety equipment and, of course, the actual load: lights and an electricity plug. Family units all share a common design but very in size as some of the families are semi-nomadic and take the systems with them when they move.
The bigger utility centres are more complex, hybrid, wind and solar, or even diesel and solar, systems providing 4 to 10 kWh/day. We build the wind turbines ourselves based on a design by Hugh Pigott but slightly modified to our unique needs. The towers are sources locally to increase local spending and create local capacity. The loads are typically a very energy efficient refrigerator, several butter churns and many other applications such as computers, sewing machines and more.
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