"These families, they are so poor. They don't have electricity," said Wadongo, a native of rural Kenya. "It's only kerosene and firewood that they use for lighting, cooking.
"The amount of money that every household uses to buy kerosene every day -- if they can just save that money, they can be able to buy food."
Wadongo, 23, not only is giving his country's rural families a way to replace the smoky kerosene and firelight with solar power, he says he also hopes his invention will ultimately improve education and reduce poverty and hunger. And he's providing it for free.
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The youngest of four children, Wadongo grew up in a home that stressed the importance of education -- his father was a high school teacher. But years of exposure to smoke while studying by kerosene and firelight left Wadongo with eyesight problems.
Video: Solar power from scrap metal With a lack of good light to study by -- Wadongo often had to share one lantern with his siblings and other family members -- he remembers the frustration of unfinished homework and poor exam performance.
"I couldn't compete effectively with other kids who had access to lighting," he said. "In every home in the village it was the same. Many children drop out of school for these reasons ... so they remain poor for the rest of their life. All along I was asking myself if there is anything that can be done to improve this situation."
In 2004, while attending a Kenyan university for agriculture and technology, Wadongo found his answer. He was fiddling with a dorm experiment involving the timing of LED (light-emitting diode) Christmas lights when it struck him: The environmentally friendly light source could be used to light rural homes.
"I knew it would have to be sourced by the sun to be useful to people in rural areas," he said, "but [I] had never seen a solar panel small enough for individual homes."
Then, while walking home from visiting a friend, Wadongo stumbled upon a broken-off piece of a discarded solar panel. With it, he was able to light a small number of LEDs. His project -- Use Solar, Save Lives -- was born.
"I immediately knew the impact that [it] would have on the rural communities," he said.
An artisan helped him design the solar lantern, which Wadongo calls MwangaBora -- Swahili for "good light."
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