Courtesy Photo | Completed solar panels on a building in the rural city of Mbour in the Republic of...... read more read more
In the rural city of Mbour in the Republic of Senegal in West Africa, more than 200 children go to school every day in a community with no electricity. Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) engineers partnered with The Lamps, a non-profit 501(c) organization, as part of their “Let There Be Light” campaign, which aims to bring electrical power to regions of the world with no affordable supply.
Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC), Carderock Division’s Dr. Peter C. Cho, an electrical engineer in Carderock’s Marine and Aviation Division, Dr. Bryant H. Kim from NSWC, Indian Head Division, and Dr. Sungshin Kwak from the Naval Research Laboratory dedicated their personal leave time from Feb. 10-19 to visit the city, located about two hours from the country’s capital of Dakar. There they installed six solar panels, bringing a source of light to a community that had no means of electricity prior to their visit.
Mbour is just one of the many communities Cho and his fellow engineers have visited over the years. They install what Cho describes as a simple solar electric power system consisting of the panels, batteries, inverter and circuit breakers, which brings the community enough power to run indoor lights and small appliances. However, Cho noted that the communities they visit do not have the luxury of appliances of any kind.
“The need in that community, as well as all of the communities we do work in, is immense,” Cho said. “Every trip I make, when I come back and arrive at the Dulles International Airport, I marvel at what a blessed country the United States truly is. One thing that always amazes me is everywhere we go the children always seem to be very happy, even in their situation. In Mbour, the children go to school but have no shoes, no sandals, and in the summertime it gets so hot – upwards of 120 degrees – they cannot wear clothes. Their happiness is not measurable with materials.”
Cho, a Korean-American who emigrated from South Korea, says that one of the main reasons he makes these trips every year is because he was lucky enough to immigrate to the U.S. and receive a good education.
“The U.S. government educated me from bachelors all the way to Ph.D. I began my career at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport, Rhode Island. I got together with some of my fellow engineers and figured out how we can pass on this great education and engineering experience to the next generation,” Cho said. “One way we do this is by providing our skills and experience to the areas where there’s no electricity available. If we can give students even something as simple as light in their school house and it can improve their chances of succeeding, improve their chances of a better education, then I am happy. That is our motivation.”
Cho said that when he first started bringing solar energy to communities without electricity he worked with a team of four engineers. Today, that team has grown to 13. The engineers not only travel on their own personal leave time, but also often fund the purchasing of the solar panels with their own money. Cho said, in some cases, they have worked to subsidize funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development and SEED International, a Christian ministry out of Virginia.
“The biggest benefit to installing solar panels is they do not require a lot of maintenance. A lot of the communities we visit are close to the equator; sun is abundant. On average, two hours of sun will provide around eight hours of electricity.”
Cho and his team have also installed solar panels in communities in Peru and Cambodia. Cho added that wherever they go, being able to provide something as simple as indoor lighting, they leave knowing that their work has improved the quality of life for the people of that community.
A video of the countdown to the lights coming on can be seen on You Tube: https://youtu.be/Bjqi2EnpuXs.
Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Division, a part of Naval Sea Systems Command, leads the Navy in hull, mechanical and electrical engineering. Headquartered in West Bethesda, Maryland, Carderock Division employs approximately 2,000 scientists, engineers, technicians and support personnel and includes detachments in Norfolk, Virginia (Little Creek); Port Canaveral, Florida; Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Memphis, Tennessee; Bangor, Washington; Ketchikan, Alaska; and Bayview, Idaho.
| Date Taken: | 03.06.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 03.07.2017 10:28 |
| Story ID: | 225864 |
| Location: | WEST BETHESDA, MARYLAND, US |
| Web Views: | 433 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, NAVSEA Engineers Volunteer to Install Solar Panels for West African Community, by Daniel Daglis, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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