A young scientist is teaming up with a Futurist art collective to explore innovative solutions for improving water quality. in informal settlements in Nairobi, Kenya.
Willy Ng’ang’a, who holds a biomedical science degree from Kenya’s Egerton University and additional training in Statistics, Ecosystem Restoration, and Green Entrepreneurship says that his current focus is on wastewater treatment using natural and locally available materials.
“In December, we were visiting Mukuru, one of the informal settlements, and I saw kids playing in the Ngong River which is so contaminated that the water is often nearly black and full of trash,” he says, “Seeing scenes like this in multiple neighborhoods, our team began discussing how millions of the urban poor in Nairobi face the paradox of water pollution and water scarcity simultaneously.”
Ng’ang’a, is part of the Nairobi Space Station, a partnership of artists, designers, scientists and environmentalists are looking at new visions for the future of the Kenyan capital, with a particular focus on ecological issues and rewilding inner-city areas.
Ng’ang’a says, the imagination of the arts combined with the STEM skills of the other team members to produce new solutions.
“Working with the artists and designers on the Kairos team, we created a visually dramatic water treatment backpack that allows viewers to see the water transformation process,” he says, adding that he is currently exploring the possibilities of using for on-the-go wastewater treatment via an introduced cactus as a natural biocoagulant, that is, a biobdegradeble chemical used to remove suspended solids from drinking water.
“The same cactus that is invasive and wreaking havoc on grazing lands in one region of Kenya ended up being a wastewater treatment solution elsewhere, potentially solving two problems at one go,” Ng’ang’a says.
Home in Nairobi
Ng’ang’a grew up in Nairobi in the 1990s, he had an early interest in science that saw him chart a course towards STEM, graduating with a degree in Biomedical Science & Technology from Kenya’s Egerton University.
“Armed with research skills and further training in statistics, I found myself gravitating towards climate and environment research, as I had a front-row seat to climate collapse issues witnessing ecological degradation in Nairobi,” he says, “Memories of the clean urban rivers swam in during my childhood, now murky with unimaginable contamination levels, inspire me to apply my research background in contributing towards solutions.”
Ng’ang’a says he believes scientific solutions developed in context are superior to solution “blindly imported” from the Global North.
“The unique perspectives that Global South scientists possess, often molded in a context of significant resource constraints, translates to inexpensive yet effective, easy-to-implement solutions that rely on locally available materials,” he says, “This underscores the importance of having Global South scientists at the forefront of investigations into local solutions to global challenges.”
Someone else from the Global South working in an urban setting is Juan de Dios Morales, nature photographer and principal founder of the Wild GYE Initiative.
His group has been using camera traps to look for the last remaining individual Jaguar of Guayaquil, Ecuador’s most populated city.