Latest
Harvest Mobile v1.6
HighlightsTodo listsTodo listsImproving the O&M and fieldwork experience for our customers and their technicians has always been a priority, and we’ve been iteratively working towards this new feature for over a year now. What started as automated algorithms, that...
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Harvest v1.22
HighlightsNew Billing PageBattery voltage displayedStability improvementsNew Billing PageIn addition to the “Export Transactions” button that gives customers full access to every charge and payment made in their networks, the new billing page on Harvest displays a...
Battery Longevity For Off-grid Applications
Battery health is crucial for remote off-grid solar systems.An off-grid solar system consists of batteries, solar panels, and charge controllers. Of these components, the battery is the most expensive, making it even more important to care for throughout its lifetime....
Deploying Solar Energy During a Power Vacuum in Haiti
35 rural households in Haiti quietly received 24/7 renewable energy during a national crisis.Just over 3 weeks ago, the news made headlines in Haiti: the Haitian president had been assassinated. The already tense situation escalated quickly and efforts towards...
Okra Solar: Start rapidly, start small and grow over time
A New Standard to End Energy Poverty
Okra is on board for the journey to provide >1000kWh/year to every man, woman and child.A study by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Energy for Growth Hub proposes a new standard to define energy poverty; they’ve set a new threshold for extreme poverty at 1000...
Apollo v1.27
-- Apollo is our cloud service responsible for all data moving in or out of our databases, as well as handling all communications to Pods in the field (receiving sensor data, sending firmware updates, handling payment enabling/disabling logic). Apollo is named after...
Harvest v1.20
HighlightsDemo desco generatorStability improvementsDemo Desco generatorInternally, it’s important we can showcase our Harvest platform for sales, fundraising, marketing, and training purposes. Ensuring data privacy for existing customers whilst only demonstrating...
Okra Named in APAC25 List & Wins Cleantech Forum Asia 2021
San Francisco, USA | 2021.06.13< - Following the release of the APAC25 2021 list by Cleantech Group, Okra Solar has received the Judges Choice Award for showing promising traction towards creating widespread social impact for rural off-grid communities around the...
Australia Funds Renewable Energy to Electrify Rural Cambodia
2021 Market Entry Analysis
Of the 800 million people living without energy today, roughly 60% will remain unenergised by 2030 if we don’t deploy off-grid solutions at scale.The State of the Market - 2021 If you’re in the energy access space, you’re probably sick to death of hearing about these...
EXO Industry a partner of the world’s first smart DC microgram with lithium storage
Taking an indirect path into a bright future
Battery Power-Sharing
The Pod now enables transmission of underutilized battery power to wherever it’s most needed at night.It is with great pride that we celebrate one of our most eagerly anticipated features of all time: Battery Power-Sharing (we’ll refer to it as BPS from now on). BPS...
Using Mesh-Grids to Energize Rural Cambodia
Cambodia’s last-mile electrification challenge It was the goal of the Cambodian government to achieve 100% countrywide electrification by the end of 2020. Whilst the government has reduced the number of off grid villages from over 14,000 to less than 500 by extending...
GVE Deploys Okra to Overcome Last-Mile Obstacles
Meet Chris... ...a 28 year old Regional Field Supervisor working for GVE Projects Limited: Nigeria’s largest solar mini-grid DisCo (Distribution Company).The importance of Chris’ job can not be overstated; he manages off-grid electrification projects in the Southern...
Siren v2.4.2
-- Siren is our ML data engine that processes all IoT sensor data sent from Pods. It automatically identifies maintenance issues that reduce maintenance and labour costs and generates “insights” that can be found on the Harvest Maintenance. Siren is named so because...
Onono
San Isidro
Founders of Cambodian Based Tech Startup Recognised Again for Creating Social Impact in Asia
Phnom Penh, Cambodia | 2021.04.21 - Afnan Hanan and Damian Veling - co-founders of Okra Solar, an energy access tech startup headquartered in Phnom Penh - have been named Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2021 for enabling utility companies in Cambodia to energize rural...
Taking Over React Apps with Dodgy Dependencies
I dare you to do two things in a React codebase of your choosing: Install an innocent progress bar module npm install nprogres/nprogress Add this import anywhere in the codebase import NProgress from 'nprogress'You’ll find that 5 seconds after loading the page, the...
Steung Chrov
Media about this community
Harvest Mobile v1.0
HighlightsHarvest Mobile App launchedStability improvementsHarvest Mobile App launchedFrom the very inception of Harvest, we knew we needed a mobile interface to capture and assist with work being done in the field. Most of 2020 was spent building the desktop web...
What Productive Power Looks Like
How a village that isn’t connected to the national grid, is using clean cooking, selling face masks and tested e-bikes.Having reliable energy infrastructure is a fundamental step towards giving people the same opportunities that most of us already have. Without...
Pod Firmware v1.11.2
HighlightsBattery sharingStability improvementsBattery sharingThis is a huge achievement, so stay tuned for a blog post entirely dedicated to the feature. Briefly, battery sharing is the ability to leverage our power sharing algorithms all through the night to better...
The Making of a Mask Factory in the Remote Village of Steung Chrov
Building a Lightweight State of Charge Algorithm: Understanding & Implementing an Extended Kalman Filter
At Okra, our goal is to build robust and extremely reliable mesh-grid networks which maximize grid uptime, as well as battery lifespan.Why do we need to calculate state of charge? The ability to identify where energy is available in the network and where energy is...
Webinar – Turning Challenges into Opportunities for Last-Mile Energy Access in West Africa
Our first webinar We were fortunate to host Okra's first webinar on March 09, 2021. Queen Iwunwa facilitated an awesome group of panelists that dialed in from around the world to discuss their unique perspective on scaling energy access in West Africa. The full...
Unlocking New Business Models For Last Mile Households: Lesson from Asia
Electricité Du Cambodge and the Australian Embassy Visit the Last-Mile in Cambodia
How Mobile Billing Works at Okra
When energizing the hardest-to-reach parts of the world, the very act of collecting money is more complicated than it looks.Mobile money is complicated Even with the rise of so many digital banking solutions, many designed specifically for unbanked rural communities,...
Okra’s Newest Mesh-Grid Site Visited by H.E. Keo Rottanak and Australian DFAT
STEUNG CHROV, KAMPONG CHHNANG | 2021.02.16 ー A visit to Steung Chrov village - a BESD energy access site led by UNDP and MME Cambodia - was made by His Excellency (H.E.) Mr. Keo Rottanak, Minister attached to the Prime Minister and Managing Director of Electricité du...
Pod Firmware v1.10
HighlightsKalman state of charge algorithmImproved panel SMPS stabilityRefactored state machine logicStability improvementsKalman state of charge algorithmAs lithium has become the prominent battery choice going forward and we started requiring a highly reliable state...
Power to the People | UNDP
Harvest v1.15
HighlightsImprovements to overview dashboardClearer performance and grid health metricsStability improvementsImprovements to overview dashboardThe overview dashboard is designed to quickly analyze a customer’s entire portfolio, from financial performance to system...
Another Win for the Last Mile in Cambodia
The community of Steung Chrov village is transforming the way we think about last-mile electrification through their adoption of novel technology.“In my village, 77 households have been set up [with power]. This project really benefits people and there are other...
Embedding Grafana using an auth proxy with Auth0
Our web app at Okra Solar had a requirement that seemed incredibly simple but turned out to be a bit tricky. We wanted to embed a Grafana dashboard for our electricity distributor partners in Cambodia/Philippines so that they can see key metrics about their customer’s...
Village first to get ‘smart-grid’ in Kampong Chhnang province
Once Upon a River: Ep3: Trouble on the Mekong
Pod Firmware v1.9
HighlightsBoost feature enabledSupport for AC outputSupport for more battery chemistriesImproved daily usage displayData optimizationsStability improvementsBoostEach Okra pod can individually be configured for daily limits, limiting the daily available capacity for...
Okra Solar is Bringing Clean Renewable Energy to Remote Corners in Asia
Clean Energy Week Cambodia 2020
Top 10 Frontier Technologies for Climate Action
Australia Finalist | Chivas Venture 2020
Okra | Solar technology for microgrids in Cambodia
Okra Solar’s new tech is a one-two punch against energy poverty
IoT-based Solar Energy Firm Okra Closes Funding from Schneider Electric, Japan’s GGG
Innovative, impactful projects pitched at PFAN-MI Clean Energy Investment Forum
We’re Continuing on Our Journey to Expand Energy Access
Amidst the challenges posed by Covid-19 we are happy to announce that we’ve just completed a convertible note round of funding. Investors include Schneider Electric, SADIF / MSP and Greenway Grid Global (A conglomerate of Tepco, Chubu Electric Power and ICMG...
Say Hello to Edamame, the Next Generation Okra Pod!
It is with great pride, blood, sweat and tears, that we officially announce the release of our next-gen IoT mesh-grid controller: the Okra Pod EdamameThis blog is the first of several that will examine and explore how Edamame works, the key driving forces behind our...
2020 Q1 – Wiping the Sadness Off Our Bums
It really burns that some people don’t have access to toilet paper in Australia. We feel for them and we also feel for the 900 million people who still don’t have access to electricity around the world. So at Okra we've spent the last few weeks wiping the sadness off...
Cambodia’s Energy in 2040: Security, Equity and Sustainability
San Isidro pilot | Infraco Asia x Okra
2019 Q4 – Shoutout to the Future
Quick Facts 65 % of the jobs children entering primary school today will be doing when they graduate, don't even exist yet. The highest-paid Youtube earner this year was an 8-year-old child reviewing toys & he pulled in more than $26 million. Achievements for 2019...
High-tech Makers in Shenzhen | CCTV English
Okra @ Tech23 2019
Bringing power to the people
And the winner of Hardware Battlefield at TechCrunch Shenzhen 2019 is… Okra
EBL Global Final A celebration of innovation
Open Energy Access Episode 02: Cicada, by Okra Solar
First off-grid smart solar network launched in Palawan
Bringing Scale to Energy Access – Okra Solar Makes the new 50 to Watch List
Cicada: An Open-Source IoT Communications Module for Energy Access
Reliable IoT connectivity to the cloud is a challenge, especially in remote areas with no WiFi or reliable internet connection. Connectivity is the most important component of any IoT device; without it, the device is simply a ‘Thing’. After many struggles seeking...
Okra Pilot Project in Sumba
The Okra Whirlwind – A Startup Story
To all future team members, friends, or anyone coming across our path, I hope these anecdotes begin to tell our story and reveal the captivating experience of being part of this company. My journey as a core engineer on this team has been filled with excitement,...
Announcing the 2019 IoT Award winners
Cheap, clean and efficient: The firm leading Cambodia’s solar revolution
Smart Axiata’s VC arm SADIF invests in Cambodian startups Okra Solar, Sousdey
Crossed interview with Schneider Electric Energy Access Fund and Okra
Schneider Fund “Pre-Seeds” Off-Grid Microgrid Tech Developer
We are Okra | #PowerToThePeople
Cambodia-based Okra Solar’s technology could bring clean energy to the world
Power to the People: Remote Microgrids Across Southeast Asia
From Concept to Reality – Engineering Innovation
As the firmware engineer (and more) here at Okra, I want to share with you how we built one of the first distributed solar microgrids and the engineering complexities we faced along the way. We are proud of our technical triumphs and engineering innovation, but they...
Okra Modular Off-Grid Energy | How it Works in Cambodia
Mesh-grids: A More Efficient Off-grid Future
At Okra our engineers have been slaving away for the last 12 months to develop a plug & play grid in a box allowing companies to easily create their own microgrid networks. The reason we decided to build this technology is because Stand Alone Solar Home Systems...
Funding to test & scale: Okra Solar receives €170K from SNV’s Innovations Against Poverty Programme
Okra Modular Microgrid Baseline Pilot
Is there a need for small scale microgrids in rural off-grid communities? What’s the potential efficiency gains over standalone solar home systems?At Okra we’ve been running theoretical calculations for a while, and they all seem to suggest that a smart connected...
Life Before Electricity and the 1.2 Billion Who Still Live It
Sorry if this post is a mess but I wanted to learn a fair few things before posting, and the rambled train of thought that proceeds reflects the order and content of research I was conducting. So why the hell am I in Cambodia right now? And how have I managed to drag...