Learning from the Ground Up: Community Energy Stories from Malawi

Abstract

There is a need to engage directly with community energy managers and operators to co-produce knowledge directly relevant to the challenges they face. In this challenge, two operators of community energy in Malawi relate their experiences on the ground, making community energy projects possible. This chapter presents two accounts of the making of community energy in Malawi, as told by the protagonists of those stories.

The first experience, written by Arnold Kadziponye, reports the story of the Mulanje Electricity Generation Agency Ltd (MEGA), in the Mulanje Massif in the south of Malawi (65 km from Blantyre). Arnold’s story shows how concerns with conservation foster the development of an electrification project. Now covering over 2000 households and expanding rapidly, the biggest lessons of Arnold’s stories relate to the engagement with the community and the need to moderate unrealistic expectations.

The second story presents the Chipopoma Power Project in Manchewe, Livingstonia, in the North of Malawi, and it is reported in the form of an interview with John Sailence, that in 2023 served 120 households. A project assembled with heterogeneous technologies and resources—including learning to build a turbine—demonstrates the potential to harness and develop the knowledge skills within the community.

10.1 Introduction

This chapter offers two contrasting stories from community operators who explain their experiences with community energy in the first person, paying attention to how local electrification has changed their communities.

The first story is told by Arnold Kadzinponye, who reports on the achievements of Mulanje Electricity Generation Agency Ltd (MEGA). A historical account of the project enables a reflection on how community energy enables place-based transformations. MEGA has grown to serve over 2000 households, but this has entailed overcoming social and economic barriers since its beginnings in 2012. One important challenge relates to the engagement of the community and the management of unrealistic expectations, such as, in this case, the provision of free electricity. MEGA shows that the governance of energy requires institutional development, a process of compromising and enrolling powerful actors within the community. Therefore, the main challenge for MEGA is to ensure that less powerful voices are not ignored and excluded from the benefits of electricity.

The second story is told by John Sailence, who reports through an interview on the Chipopoma Hydropower Project, of which he is the principal architect. The Chipopoma project is a makeshift project that has been painstakingly assembled from multiple resources simultaneously and has faced existential challenges regularly since its inception in 2017. The case of Chipopoma challenges common ideas about the lack of skills within communities and demonstrates that these can be developed through the construction of a community energy project.

While the projects are different and in different stages of development, they demonstrate the need to read community energy projects as work in progress, always in the making. Their dynamic nature means the project can constantly adapt to new demands and emerging opportunities. Community energy projects may be heterogeneous and sometimes precarious. Still, they help harness local ingenuity and match it with external resources while confronting the radical uncertainty of living under climate change.

10.2 Finding Inspiration in the Story of MEGA

The topography of Mulanje provides good potential for the use of hydropower. The slopes of Mount Mulanje provide high head, while high rainfall rates at elevated altitudes provide significant water flow. The average annual rainfall of Mulanje is 1600 mm, reaching 2849 mm at elevated altitudes (compared to a world average of 860 mm). Surface runoff is the primary water source in the district. The mean annual runoff of Mulanje Rivers is estimated at 51.63 m3/s (including the Rivers Likhubula, Thuchila, Likulezi, Phalombe, Sombani, Nandiwo, Muloza, Lichenya and Ruo). Because of the variability and evaporation losses, only about 66% of the mean annual runoff can be exploited to produce electricity with the current technology. Lujeri Tea Estates were already exploiting some of the hydro potential of the Mulanje Mountain. The estate was generating 840 kW. Much more can be achieved by exploring other rivers, especially in areas far from the national grid (Fig. 10.1).

Fig. 10.1

The rivers of mount mulanje provide ample opportunities for electricity generation

Mulanje Renewable Energy Agency, Practical Action and Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust came together to improve access to modern energy in the rural area of Malawi by tapping the potential of the water resources of Mount Mulanje.

When this initiative was brought into our village, I didn’t think I would live to witness the use of electricity in our village, let alone in my house and shop. There was a time when we lost hope that this was impossible; the project was just trying to experiment on us, and it was becoming difficult for the implementers to concede failure, looking at the long time it was taking and the information we had earlier. This brought much desperation. And now that I am one of the beneficiaries of this, as I do have electricity that I am using to light my house, my electric kettle is used to make hot water within the shortest possible time as opposed to when we had to light a fire using firewood. Imagine I have now procured a refrigerator, which I am stocking cold drinks for sale. (B.B. Godfrey of Chuma ndi Anthu Grocery)

Night falls early on Mount Mulanje. At 17:30 hours, the sun sets, and the local schools in Bondo village (Kabichi Community Day Secondary School and Kabichi Primary School) are in total darkness. After a day’s farming at the local smallholder tea field or working at a nearby (15 km away) diesel-powered maize mill, the people of the village light their homes with candles, log fires, kerosene lanterns or battery-powered lamps. While these energy sources provided families with one or two hours of light in which to read and cook, they were becoming increasingly expensive because of high inflation. People in Mount Mulanje felt a pressing need to access electricity.

Lack of access to energy services had other implications for the local communities around Mulanje Mountain. It was rare, for instance, to find qualified teachers and health personnel willing to live in an area without electricity. In Bondo village, schools had to turn down computers from the Ministry of Education and other well-wishers because there was no electricity to run them. Even the local health centre was resource-constrained to the point that women in childbirth were asked to bring their own candles to light their delivery process. Minor ailments such as BP testing were referred to the 25 km away Mulanje District Hospital. The Bondo Health Centre failed to administer quality service as the facility had no storage for medicine because most medicines must be kept in cool places.

The forest reserve was not spared. Almost 100% of the households in the area relied on biomass in the form of firewood for cooking. This firewood was sourced from the Mulanje Mountain Forest Reserve and the degradation exerted to the environment was witnessed each passing day. Efforts by organizations like Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust to restore and conserve biodiversity couldn’t match the levels of degradation caused by the ever-growing population. The land holding size in Mulanje is very low because a big portion of the land is occupied by the tea companies.

10.2.1 The Social Enterprise Model

Mulanje Electricity Generation Agency (MEGA) Ltd is an innovative, inclusive business aiming to transform this situation for households living in mountainous areas with fast-flowing water, where there is potential for micro-hydro power generation. MEGA is a start-up company providing energy to off-grid low-income households. It targets a potential market of 520,000 people in the Mount Mulanje area who will be able to access energy services, of which 9,600 households (42,420 men, women, and children) are expected to be directly connected (Fig. 10.2).

Fig. 10.2

MEGA is the first social enterprise to be licenced for the generation and transmission of electricity in malawi

MEGA was established as a social enterprise and is the first operational private energy company in Malawi to be licenced for generation and transmission. MEGA’s business model focuses on making energy available and affordable to its target market by promoting price minimization, rather than ‘traditional’ profit maximization, within the parameters of building a financially sustainable business.

History has it that MEGA is the first privately owned micro-hydro energy provider in Malawi. It operates through partnership with MMCT (governance), MuREA (site & business development) and Practical Action (technical expertise). MEGA produces and distributes micro-hydroelectricity to consumers found in off-grid, pro-poor subsistence farming communities at the base of the south-eastern part of Mulanje Mountain. MEGA collects tariffs through prepaid metres to households and credits sold by community vendors (still in progress) and supports the development of business centres and community facilities that may agree on tailored payment plans with MEGA. Consumers are classified according to their energy demands, and these include On-Grid and Off-Grid Rural Households, which fall under the Domestic Tariff; Business entities under the Business Tariff (mostly maize mills but also welders); and lastly, Community Assets (schools, hospitals, churches), under the Social Tariff.

All project preparatory works, including community engagement, feasibility studies, environmental impact assessments, project design and execution, were done by MuREA between 2008 and 2013. MuREA is a non-profit organization established at the end of the Programme for Basic Energy Conservation (PROBEC), a SADC regional programme supported by the German Agency for Technical Co-operation (GIZ). PROBEC had different programmes, including the promotion of clay stoves in rural areas and the training of stove producers, partner organizations and village-based trainers; training metal workers to become institutional rocket stove producers; identifying employers with a large staff base so as to encourage the use of efficient, fixed household rocket stoves (like Esperanza and Changu stoves) and encouraging the development of energy devices that are appropriate for productive use by small and medium enterprises that involve the burning of wood, including the promotion of efficient Tobacco rocket barns.

MuREA took over these programmes from PROBEC with a continued focus on efficient stoves. However, looking at the many perennial rivers flowing from the beautiful Mount Mulanje, MuREA felt it possible to generate hydropower and conducted studies to understand the flow rates and terrain suitable for electricity generation. In 2008, the Lichenya River was identified as a potential site, so the Bondo community was targeted for the project. This was a farfetched dream requiring new technical and social skills to convince the community. The bottom line was that MMCT, being a biodiversity conservation-conscious firm, had an interest in seeing the communities use the generated power for cooking to reduce the degradation of the environment happening on the Mount Mulanje Biosphere Reserve.

People surrounding the Bondo area, drawn from the villages Kalamwa, Nkundi, Nkhulambe, Bondo, Bondo II, Kashoni, Naimbele and Naluwade, were mobilized for the project and contributed to the works in kind through the provision of labour, fetching rocks and sand, and working on the construction to ensure they got electricity. Members of the community became excited upon seeing that power came from an initiative they took part in. The first customer got connected in 2013 when people couldn’t still imagine their dream was coming into reality. Seeing the health centre illuminated had an enormous impact on the community. The excitement and jubilation expressed through singing and dancing overnight was an experience that left a mark on each face of the inhabitants of Bondo. This moved many people into investing in having their own houses wired in anticipation that they would soon forget using the hazardous kerosene for some clean, renewable energy.

10.2.2 Building Local Leadership

Community leaders played a very important role in ensuring that community members participated in the project. They developed a roaster showing which village was supposed to work on which date, and they made sure people were working every day, including weekends, to meet the target of delivering the project and having electricity in 5 years. A member of the community GVH Bondo recalls:

When officers from MUREA came to discuss the potential of generating electricity from the river in our community, we thought it was a lie and that it was in no way possible as we knew MUREA as an organization that promoted efficient cookstoves. It took several meetings and the involvement of government officials from the district council, including the District Commissioner himself, to convince the community that we could generate our own electricity. We previously had applied to have power from the national grid; we were given a quotation of MK80m to have transmission lines for a distance of 8 kilometres, which we couldn’t have managed to raise such an amount; we just withdrew the dream and accepted that we would never have electricity in our community. People walked 8 kilometres to access a maize mill at Mimosa and have their phones charged. Interestingly, very few people owned phones and walked 25 kilometres to Chitakale to access welding services and battery charging, which was time-consuming and costly at the same time.

Village Headman Kalamwa recalls the excitement that inspired the project:

When work started around 2008, people were excited and knew that this would translate into real development which would transform the community. Everyone, including school-going children, understood that the coming of electricity into Bondo would lead to greater transformation in all sectors such as education, health and the social and economic status as enterprises would blossom in the area.

In every case, the leaders see themselves as helping fulfil a collective dream, with little consideration for any form of opposition or dissent in the village. Electricity comes with its own form of consensus, predicated on ideas of modernity and an ever-changing world of new communication and household appliances. Electricity is presented as a bountiful gift without any costs. Thus, leaders play an important role in adjusting expectations to reality.

Discussions led to the formation of a community management structure known as the Village Electricity Committee (VEC) and developed a constitution to guide their operations. Each village under the project elected a representative in addition to the village chief, also a VEC member. The Village Electricity Committee elects the chairperson, vice chairperson, secretary, vice secretary, treasurer and committee members. The committee consists of a majority of women (more or less 70% of the members), and women have served as chairpersons, too (as of December 2023, the VEC is led by Mrs Delli Nessi, serving her second 3-year term). The VEC also elects members to form the discipline arm, projects arm and business development arm. They recruit and train local villagers as powerhouse operators, transmission power linesmen, and clerks and help develop local leadership skills. Thus, in practice, the VEC serves as a bridge between the community and the operations teams. They handle power supply-related conflicts and customer grievances.

The initial arrangement was that people would access free electricity upon the completion of the project. Later, it was discovered that offering free electricity would be practically impossible because the project's running costs would require finances for paying workers, meeting operational costs, and ensuring coverage for the maintenance and repair of broken-down equipment. A decision was made for household customers to pay a flat rate of MK1000 per month, with chiefs still getting free power supply. This system raised questions of fairness because of the privilege given to chiefs and because a flat rate did not consider different household conditions and varying energy demands. A Business Innovation Facility (BIF) study to develop a sustainable business model for the project recommended the introduction of prepaid metering so that customers pay in relation to their power demand. A further challenge was that MuREA, being a non-profit organization, could not sell electricity to households. This led to the birth of Mulanje Electricity Generation Agency Ltd. MEGA had taken an innovative approach to community-based energy generation: instead of site development followed by ‘hand over’ to communities, MEGA would continue to run all sites to achieve economies of scale while maintaining the engagement and purchase of the communities. As a social enterprise, MEGA is inclusive throughout its value chain: communities participate in the ownership and governance structures of the organization, in site construction, operation and retail, and form the key target customer group.

10.2.3 Community Energy in Practice

MEGA is a pioneer private energy company in Malawi, generating electricity from 3 powerhouses cascaded along the Lichenya River with a total capacity of 220 kW ( 60 kW, 110 kW, and 60 kW, respectively). The powerhouses are named after their project period. Bondo 1 got financing from the European Commission in 2012 and later the Tea Estates (mainly Sukambizi Smallholder Tea Association through Fairtrade premiums). Bondo 2 was initially financed internally by MMCT and Practical Action, but the floods of January 2015 washed away the building before the turbine, and the generator was installed. An additional grant from the Colombian Environmental Fund enabled the completion of the project. Bondo 3 got funding from the Scottish Government, the UNDP Global Environmental Facility (GEF), and the Government of Malawi (through the Department of Energy Affairs).

In July 2013, MEGA’s first micro-hydro scheme at Lower Bondo on the Lichenya River became partially operational, and the community started seeing results and opportunities immediately. Power was being distributed to households, shops and government health facilities. Businesses were achieving greater turnover due to extended trading hours enabled by the clean lighting. New enterprises were being set up. Bondo’s school had nearly doubled the number of teachers on its books. However, the project faced multiple challenges including funding availability (for example the Department of Education has not been able to provide funds to wire the school), enrolment of the community during the operationalization of revenue collection methods, and disruptions in the supply chain.

At the time, in Bondo 1, there was no consideration of standards: people just fell trees and perched them as poles, ready to have their homes connected. One chief, Nkundi, went to source such trees for poles from Lujeri Tea Estates and was given a tractor load. These were enough to connect his whole village. In the meantime, MEGA waited anxiously for a generation licence from the Malawi Energy Regulatory Authority (MERA). When MERA officials visited for assessment and noticed the untreated poles, they advised MEGA to source poles from recommended suppliers. Sukambizi Trust of smallholder tea farmers funded the procurement of treated poles. A Zimbabwe supplier was commissioned to deliver the posts because they provided a longer warranty (35-year, instead of the 12-year warranty offered locally) and the cost, including transportation, was lower than those quoted by local suppliers. However, when the trucks carrying the poles reached the Malawi Boarder Post at Mwanza, the Department of Forestry demanded a certificate that the company had not anticipated. It took the intervention of the Department of Energy Affairs to negotiate the certificate with their forestry counterpart.

The critical challenge facing MEGA now (as of 2023) is to reach scale and financial sustainability while adhering to its founding principles of providing affordable, available, sustainable electricity to ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’ consumers, reaching everyone in the communities, even the most disadvantaged. MEGA’s financial projections predicted operational break-even in Year 6 after the fifth micro-hydro turbine was commissioned. Donor grant funding was needed to build and commission each site, totalling approximately $2 mn in the first five years and $1.4 mn for the second five years and over $1.2 mn has already been spent on the first site and surveys for sites two and three. The upfront infrastructure investment was high and largely charged in US dollars while the potential tariffs are limited by consumers’ ability to pay and are largely in Malawian Kwacha.

The availability of local human and technical capacity has also been a challenge. If MEGA is able to achieve and maintain momentum, there could be potential to influence the wider energy landscape in Malawi, paving the way for further investment in private energy provision and facilitating the development of a skills market. MEGA’s development has challenged the Malawian administration to review their current licencing frameworks for privately owned energy companies. The new energy bill is likely to make it easier for other privately owned transmission and distribution entities to operate.

The productive use component of the Bondo Micro Hydro Scheme Project works to improve the economic status and livelihoods of the local community in the area through the advancement of economic benefits in utilizing and optimizing opportunities and access to locally generated hydropower electricity in the area. Mega is also strongly interested in increased electricity consumption and revenue from business customers. Hence, MEGA has equally focused on productive uses, social uses, and the institutionalization of the VEC. MEGA lacks an in-depth analysis of community differences and whether any processes of discrimination and exclusion are at work in a society so deeply marked by economic inequality and a complex landscape of post-colonial relations (Fig. 10.3).

Fig. 10.3

VEC Installations

The impact of electricity on Bondo’s everyday life cannot be overstated. The coming of electricity in the Bondo area has witnessed the mushrooming of different business enterprises, some of which being shops with refrigerator groceries items and selling cold drinks, electricity bulbs, freezers (using a home refrigerator to sell freezers/sweet beer (thobwa); video showing; barber shops and saloons; phone charging; battery charge; tailoring; fresh fish (Kalapao); bars (opaque and bottled beer); burning audio discs; video shooting and editing and many more. Many women have constructed new business models and entrepreneurial activities, such as selling freezers in homesteads, providing them autonomy and empowerment. One middle-aged resident, Line Mangani of Kalamwa Village, says:

Kale ndikangodikira bambo a m’nyumba andipatse ndalama ndikagule masamba, koma tsopano pano ndikutenga ndalama yanga mkuthamangira pamsika ndekha

(Before starting selling freezers, I used to wait for my husband to give me money to buy vegetables, but now I can decide to go to the market as I do have my own money)

Currently, MEGA has connected over 2000 customers, 13 schools (2 community day secondary schools), 12 maize mills, 1 health centre, and 8 churches and supports over 400 enterprises accessing microfinancing services through a commercial bank to support growing their businesses. The health centre remains MEGA’s biggest customer. A big drug storage facility requires power 24/7, and MEGA has been supplying that needed power without interruptions. MEGA still faces a challenge related to how customers can get tokens for the prepaid metres as it is done manually, and it takes three days for one to get the token after paying. Efforts are at an advanced stage to engage mobile money apps where customers will be able to purchase units and input data in their metres while in their homes.

Over the past two years, MEGA has facilitated the introduction of electric cooking to households that are accessing electricity from MEGA. The project fits well with the initial dream of MMCT to have people around Mount Mulanje use the electricity for cooking, thereby displacing the use of biomass. This project is undergoing registration for carbon credits. Households are provided with a double plate hotplate, a wonder box (heat retention fireless cooker), and steel pots for cooking. Each household has a smart metre installed to capture data on household electricity usage and usage for cooking. The pilot had good results related to understanding how much savings a household can make compared to using charcoal or firewood. Initially, 20 households participated in the pilot study, and 100 additional households were issued with the cooking devices. The participating households contributed 30% of the total equipment cost and paid in instalments. Given the success of the projects, current efforts aim at enrolling an additional 500 households to be added to the project in 2023.

10.2.4 A Future Outlook

The Bondo project has made electricity an enabler of social and economic development: reduced poverty and improved well-being, livelihoods and economic development, health and education all have been impacted by local electrification. The diversification of livelihoods also facilitates conservation. New opportunities are opening for the electrification of cooking and the expansion of the network. Learning is accelerating across communities, with the design of new tariffs and prepayment technologies enabling the consolidation of sustainable financial models of management. At the core of the project is the constitution of a social enterprise, MEGA that works as an intermediary between the project and the community. Close coordination with the purpose-organized Village Electricity Committee and tribal chiefs helps guide and prioritize investments and promotes a sense of ownership in the community.

The project, however, has not been without challenges. The aspiration to provide free electricity was soon moderated by the realities and the costs of running a project such as this. MEGA faces even bigger challenges with ambitious plans to continue expanding the project. There is a need, however, for MEGA to explore more closely its means of operation, and the way the community is constituted around it. Are there patterns of difference that MEGA contributes to reproduce, and how? Are there any members of the community who are not yet benefiting from the project? Could MEGA reach them? As challenges are overcome, new questions arise on the horizon.

10.3 Energy Dreams and Energy Futures: An Interview with John Sailence

Chipopoma Community Energy Project: My name is John Sailence, and I come from northern Malawi, from a place called Manchewe. Chipopoma Power is a project that generates electricity for the community using hydropower. We use a 53 kVA alternator, and we generate about 40 kW. So far, we have connected 120 houses and a few businesses around us.

From dreams to reality: The project started… first, it was just like a joke. When I was a kid, I liked to play with some toys that ran on electricity and had batteries, motors, and small lightbulbs. But I lacked electricity, so I started playing with friends who had a better knowledge of electricity. They started introducing me to the type of motors that could produce electricity, like a bicycle dynamo. And we started playing with those things. Then, my mind started growing all kinds of ideas from that bicycle dynamo. Yeah. So, I had a plan that when I grew up, I would have to find a way to generate electricity. I dreamt of using the Manchewe waterfall. Our community is very close to the waterfall, only a few metres. After many years, nobody used this waterfall even though Manchewe is so far from the National Grid. So, I kept dreaming that one day, maybe I would generate electricity to have a barber shop, a TV show, and a phone charger so that the community could work, charge their phone and watch videos here in Manchewe (Fig. 10.4).

Fig. 10.4

John sailence walking towards the manchewe waterfall

Micro-hydropower, in a nutshell: We have a steep place along the waterfall, which is 130 m. So we connected the pipes from the river going down by the waterfall cliff. At the bottom, we built a powerhouse that contains the turbine and the alternator. Then, some of the work went into putting the water in the pipe. That water goes down with high pressure just because it's too steep. At the end of the pipe is a small jet, only 40 millimetres. In this way, the water forces the small jet to get out, with a lot of pressure. Then it hits the turbine, and then the turbine spins. A shaft is attached to the pulley, which is attached to the belt to the pulley of the alternator. So that when the turbine spins, the alternator spins too. And that is how we generate electricity.

Gaining attention: There were a few people who were interested in my ideas, but the first person who ever wanted to talk with me was an entrepreneur called Cameron Mcallister, who used to work at the Mushroom Farm, an alternative lodge in Manchewe. One day, I explained to him my vision of making electricity from the waterfall, and he asked me if that would be possible. I said, with conviction, “Yes!” And many community members were already saying, “Yes, we really need electricity.” So, I asked them, “For what do you need it?” And then people answered that they needed it for the barber shop, cooking, and the maize mill. So, I asked myself what kind of device could power a maize mill.

The power of serendipitous encounters: I used to work for The Mushroom Farm as a chef. And that is when I met Cameron and others and started to explain my plans. In this way, I connected with Hastings Mkandawire from Mzuzu, who is building maize mills and other things. Hastings and I worked on a turbine and discussed where we could source an alternator. I returned all excited, and then, back in the community, I met the chef, the chief principal, Gadabassi. I explained my project and my dreams to him and asked for land. It was not difficult to convince him. He said, “No problem, we will help you because we want electricity. We will offer you free land.” And that is how we got free land for the project. Now we work in close partnership together in the community. The project is governed by a Board of 13 community members, four men and nice women. As the Board requests, we are always working to empower women and give them a say in the project because women rarely join us in the management of the plant (Fig. 10.5).

Fig. 10.5

The chipopoma power plant still relies on makeshift technology which is improved day on day

Electricity changes communities: There is a very big change. Many businesses developed from the electricity we provide. There are a few barber shops that use electricity, and there are a few salons and a butcher. And there is the education. If there are any school fails, really, there are just very few: most people here, now they have electricity, get very good results. Maybe some will even go to university just because they had enough time, no, a lot of time, to study their subjects because electricity extended the hours during which they could study. The project has had a very big impact on education and that is really, really good. Now, we are trying to introduce a pump that will be pumping water from the bottom to the hills so that the water goes higher, and then when it runs back, the farmers can divert it for irrigation. This is electricity. It is doing a lot of things. And yes, on top of all that, we have the maize mill! The farmers take maize to process it and make nsima.¹ There are a lot of coffee farmers in Livingstonia, and they are using electricity to deshell to remove the skin, which is also having a very big impact on their income.

Transforming cooking practices: People used to cut trees because they needed firewood for cooking. But now, people are increasingly using hotplates powered by electricity, and they no longer need firewood. And my imagination is now dreaming again. When I see people using electricity for cooking, I think of how I can improve this project so that it has more capacity, enough to support everybody using hotplates and maintain the electricity provision at affordable prices. If you had come to Livingstonia in 2009 and seen how beautiful it was, and then seen it again now, you would think that the land is bare. Before, it was all green. And being green is important to attract tourists and new businesses. People come to Livingstonia for its history because of the Scottish Mission. But the Mission is changing because of deforestation. At Chipopoma Power, we hope to encourage the use of electricity so that people do not cut more firewood.

Connecting people: We started putting the project together in 2017, and in 2022, we started generating electricity for only a few houses. We started with 30 houses, but now we have expanded to 120 houses. We don't have the facilities and resources to expand to more customers. More people are willing to be connected, and we are willing to connect more people all the time. The High Voltage distribution network covers a radius of about 3.5 km, and the Medium Voltage, I think, is now over 12 km, but we keep on adding up: it has grown from 9 to 12 km since we started. The costs of the network were covered by a grant from the UNDP. We also received support from the University of Sheffield, Mzuzu University, and the University of Addis Ababa, who helped the project with phase balancing because some people were consuming a lot of electricity, and this resulted in damage to the generator, which was causing a lot of damage to the generator. CESET visited Chipopoma, and we explained some of the problems that we are facing. I also had some online training, and although it was through the phone, I could understand the problem, and we also got additional technical support to organize the tariff system. This helped the Project to better manage the demand from the project. We invested in switches that could help us to balance the phases and divide electricity equally for people to use electricity according to how much they need to consume because initially, there were many people using hotplates, but the system could not supply sufficient electricity for everyone. The new measures have helped protect the alternator. Without CESET, the project may no longer exist because we would have blown the alternator.

Networks of power and networks of people: Connecting with universities helps us a lot. Different universities, sometimes from other countries, have visited the Chipopoma Power Project. The project CESET, for example, brought different people from different universities and countries. Then, I could express myself and the problems that I'm facing. They were able to work with me to find out how to solve these challenges and help me access the technical expertise that I needed, from understanding the problem to defining measures for the phase balance to improving my calculations about the network load. And the challenges are multiple. CESET also supported us in buying protection from lightning, just because Livingstonia is at a very high altitude and we have many electrical storms. One storm blew one of the transformers. This could also cause damage to the houses. Those protections were very important to keep the project going (Fig. 10.6).

Fig. 10.6

The manchewe waterfall continues to inspire

Big dreams, big hopes: I am always planning for Chipopoma to grow. We have discovered that we have the potential to generate more electricity. In five years, I would like to generate more electricity so that we can have a lot more customers as well as to sell some of the electricity to the national grid. Currently, the Chipopoma Power Project is not sustainable because we have very few customers. We depend on grants and ad hoc support, such as that provided by CESET. I would like Chipopoma to become a good example for our country.

The future of community energy in Malawi: Community energy is only starting in Malawi. It is very slow, and very few people can access this. I would like to spread this model and explain our experiences so that everybody has access to this electricity because as of now, very few people have electricity in the country. There is a lot of demand. There are still areas we have to reach that we have not reached yet because we do not have enough resources to extend the network. But the demand is high and growing.

10.4 Conclusion: Community Energy in Practice

The experiences of Bondo and Manchewe demonstrate the important role that community energy can play in accelerating the transition to sustainable energy in Malawi. However, they do not provide a triumphalist account of their projects, and they present them as work in progress not only because they have plans to extend the network but also because the continued learning involved in the project means that a community energy project is always a work in progress. Though both projects share many characteristics (e.g., a mountainous environment, the use of hydropower, and a similar regulatory environment), the projects present important differences. Talking with each other, Arnold and John joke that they are at different stages of development.

One of the main differences, however, is that the projects have been developed in extremely different institutional environments. MEGA emerges from a concern with conservation, and the relationships with the Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust and Practical Action have enabled the ongoing continuation of the project, even when facing difficult challenges. Moreover, their institutional collaboration has facilitated further support from other institutions, such as the University of Strathclyde. In contrast, the project of Chipopoma has not had that continuous support and has relied on the personal networks of John Sailence himself and local businesses such as the Mushroom Lodge. While John’s heroic story of an individual fighting for a dream constitutes a good storyline, it comes at a significant personal cost and may hinder the long-term sustainability of the project. The long-term sustainability of the Chipopoma Power Project depends both on extending the network of customers to make it financially viable and extending the institutional network of institutional partners so that ad hoc support can be found when needed.

This is the reason why sustainable energy scholars in Malawi have advocated for the government to provide institutional and financial resources to small-scale projects that as the Chipopoma Power Project (see Chapter 9), to harness the potential of each community to take control of their energy futures.