Asfafaw Haileslasie

• Postdoctoral Researcher
• Postdoctoral Researcher at Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Ethiopia possesses abundant wind resources that have the potential to revolutionize its energy sector by providing reliable and sustainable electricity through wind power. Despite the presence of a few operational wind farms, the country is facing challenges in generating sustainable electricity. The slow progress in wind power development raises c...

This research experimentally demonstrates the practicability of using large-sized direct solar frying as an alternative technology for the predominantly biomass-based injera baking method. The system was designed and developed with fryers 40, 50, and 55 cm in diameter and two operational options: continuous mode and alternating mode. Extensive expe...

As the Ethiopian energy demand urges for fuel options, it is essential to identify biomass fuels and estimate their energy potential. This study quantified the agricultural residues’ biomass resources and their energy potential. Further analyzed and characterized the potential nature through quantitative and qualitative methodologies with descripti...

Ethiopia has the potential to be 100% renewable. Its renewables are capable to solve its energy poverty and energy shortage in East Africa. The country’s climate resilient green economy strategy considers energy as key enabler for vibrant economy. The objective of this paper is to identify key challenges of the energy sector by studying 12 years of...

The 2030 sustainable development goal (SDG7) target progress indicators show that developing countries are off track. Ethiopia’s low performance to the SDG7 has endangered its economic, societal, and environmental sustainability. The performance in clean cooking has contested its policy, institutional setup, and R&D. The objective of this paper lie...

Background Injera is food consumed daily by Ethiopians like bread and rice in other parts of the world. Biomass stoves are used to bake Injera in most rural households. The unsustainable use of fuelwood causes deforestation. Improved cook stoves such as Mirt (name in local language) were introduced to replace traditional stoves and save fuel wood....

Although teff ( Eragrostis tef ) is a very important staple food crop in Ethiopia, its production is constrained by low productivity due to poor access and adoption rate of improved seed by farmers. The government of Ethiopia envisions realizing an efficient teff value chain that enables a sustainable increase of smallholder teff productivity. As a...

Energy poverty is at its highest risk in Africa and yet introducing clean and modern energy in rural Africa demands huge resource. Most African rural use biomass energy in traditional cook stoves. Similarly, Ethiopia’s rural are using traditional stoves with their associated risks. Injera, the highly consumed food in the country is the most energy...

Properly recorded solar radiation data are very important in providing accurate information on solar radiation intensity and potential for the application of any solar energy technology. Since such type of data is hardly available in most developing countries like Ethiopia, analysis of temporal and spatial variations of solar radiation is essential...

The availability of solar energy resource information in Ethiopia is limited due to the lack of ground measurement stations. The aim of this work was, therefore, to estimate the temporal variation and spatial distribution of solar radiation for Geba catchment located in the Northern part of Ethiopia based on four selected measurement sites. To achi...

In Ethiopia, like most developing countries, the majority of households depend on wood and charcoal as their cooking energy resources. This energy has a direct impact on the forest coverage and its emissions have significant health issues. Biogas technology has introduced to address these problems and reduce energy poverty in developing countries....

This paper deals with PHL management of Guava fruit through small-scale juice processing in rural areas that have no access of modern energy. Guava trees cover large areas in Tigray region of Ethiopia, however, during the harvest period the consumption and yield of the fruit is not in balance. Consequently, considerable amount of the fruit spoiled...

This paper deals with a performance evaluation of locally made 20L batch type reactor and JP and AM biodiesels produced by using this reactor. The inputs for transesterification process were Jatropha and Argemone Mexicana oils, with an alcohol to oil molar ratio of 6:1, 1% NaOH catalyst, 55 °C reaction temperature, an hour settling time and 600 rpm...

This paper deals with a performance evaluation of locally made 20L batch type reactor and JP and AM biodiesels produced by using this reactor. The inputs for transesterification process were Jatropha and Argemone Mexicana oils, with an alcohol to oil molar ratio of 6:1, 1% NaOH catalyst, 55 °C reaction temperature, an hour settling time and 600 rpm...

directly affect the patients. In off grid health centers and health posts, solar autoclave can have great contribution to facilitate modern heath care delivery by sterilizing medical infected equipment and reduces associated health risks. This research has developed a solar thermal based autoclave and analyzed its performance. The numerical and exp...

In this study, a solar powered indirect food dryer is designed and developed. The dryer design consists of a solar collector unit, drying chamber with two columns of four rack shelves, chimney for the exhaust air, and a solar powered fan. The outlet of the dryer is designed in a truncated pyramid geometry so that precipitation of condensed water wo...

Today, many developing countries are using biomass as their primary energy supply. However, this energy affects the environment, health and safety of women and children. In addition, utilization of this energy using traditional cooking stoves is causing indoor air pollution and in turn health problems to millions of people. To overcome such problem...

Injera is a staple food particular to Ethiopia and Eritrea. It is one of the most consumed food by most of the 100 million population in the two countries. The conventional Injera baking process is an energy intensive, inefficient and mainly biomass energy based as majority of the population live off-grid. This oil based indirect solar fryer for In...

Latent heat storage and efficient heat transport technology helps to utilize the intermittent solar energy for continuous and near isothermal applications. However, many latent heat storages face challenges of storage charging, heat retaining, and discharging the stored heat. This paper tries to address the challenges of heat transportation and sto...

The Injera baking electrical mitad is the most energy-consuming device in every household in Ethiopia. This research presents a detail engineering study on the energy-consumption performance of existing electrical mitad in Mekelle city. The research work considered thirty-one electrical mitad from different workshops in Mekelle. Depending on the nu...

Injera is a traditional staple pancake and it is part of the daily dish to most of the one hundred million population in Ethiopia and Eritrea. The conventional baking method uses either biomass in rural areas or Electricity in majority of urban areas. A direct solar fryer for Injera baking application is developed as an alternative to the conventio...

With the new advancements in vibration control strategies and controllable actuator manufacturing, semi-active actuators and dampers are finding their way as an essential part of vibration isolators, particularly in vehicle suspension systems. This is attributed to the fact that in a semi-active system, the damping coefficients can be adjusted to i...

In Ethiopia, there is an abundant source of solar energy that is estimated to 5.3 kWh/m2/day. However, more than 90% of the society uses biomass as a main source of energy for cooking due to lack of technologies to convert this energy. Replacing these cooking activities by using renewable energy resources decreases pollution and reduces deforestati...

A wind pump prototype with 3.6 m rotor diameter, 19 m hub height above ground and 0.22 mm reciprocating pump stroke has been developed at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Mekelle University. The prototype was designed and manufactured locally. Theoretical model based on combined efficiency of the rotor and the reciprocating pump was used t...

Latent heat storage and efficient heat transport technology helps to utilize the intermittent solar energy for continuous and near isothermal applications. Nonetheless, latent heat storages face challenges of storage charging, heat retaining, and discharging the stored heat. The focus point of solar concentrators is the ideal position to collect ma...

Many developing countries use biomass as their primary energy supply. Unwise utilization of biomass affects the environment, health and safety of women and children in particular. In addition, it causes indoor air pollution, which is a reason to the deaths of millions. This paper demonstrates solar cooker with an integrated PCM thermal storage and...

Ethiopia, the second most populated country in Africa, meets 96% of its energy need from bio-mass and majority of this energy goes entirely to Injera baking. Injera, a pan-cake like bread that is consumed by most of the population, demands a temperature of 180-220 oC to be well baked. Both traditional and newly developed biomass Injera stoves are e...

Ethiopia with a population of about 85 million meets 96% of its energy needs with bio-mass, charcoal, wood, animal dung and plant residues. More than 50% of this energy goes entirely on baking Injera. Injera the national food of the country demands 180-220 °C to be well cooked. In this article; Injera baking with solar energy on off-focus system, s...

Box solar cookers are commonly built with internal sheet metal painted black as an absorber. In order to increase the performance, a design which incorporates internal reflection is proposed in this paper. The aim of this paper is to report comparisons made between box solar cookers with and without internal reflector. Theoretical modelling of the...

The global shift towards renewable energy is manifested in developing countries such as Ethiopia primarily because of continuous economic growth in the last two decades and secondly due to the vast untapped potential resources. In addition to other factors, the lack of accurate data of the resources has, however, hampered the development of solar e...

Many of today's solar cookers lack energy storage and their applications have been limited to day time use while the sun is shining. In addition these cookers need longer cooking time and are less versatile to users compared with the traditional wood stoves. This article presents tests of a solar stove with and integrated heat storage designed to s...

Wind energy potential in Ethiopia is estimated to be enormous due to local peculiar landscape situations. However, the country started to utilize the potential only very recently. One of the reasons for low utilization of wind energy in Ethiopia is the absence of reliable and accurate wind energy resource data. Development of reliable and accurate...