In a metal fabrication workshop on the edge of Wote town, Justus explains a decision that has become increasingly common among small business owners in this part of Kenya: the shift to solar power.

“We sometimes experience blackouts, which prompted us to invest in solar,” he says. “Also, the electricity price can be too high compared to our production budget, so this also convinced us to invest in solar to reduce production costs.

A few kilometres away, at Makueni Cooperative Union Limited, the calculation was similar, but the stakes were different. The cooperative processes milk collected from local farmers, who are paid at the end of each month based on what they supply. When the cost of electricity from the national grid began cutting into production budgets, it wasn’t just the cooperative’s bottom line at risk; it was the income of every farmer in its network.

“Using KPLC was very costly for our production, and it affected the bottom line of our member farmers,” says manager Bernard. Working with the county government, the cooperative acquired a solar system. “The solar system has immensely improved our operations and income for farmers,” he adds.

Between them, Justus’s workshop and the Makueni Cooperative illustrate the two faces of energy access that Strathmore University School of Computing and Engineering Sciences’ Sunsafe research team is trying to understand: solar as a straightforward fix for cost and reliability, and solar as a lever that can ripple outward into a wider local economy.

The research is being carried out with support from the Powering Renewable Energy Opportunities (PREO) grant, funded by the IKEA Foundation and UK aid through the Transforming Energy Access platform, and delivered by the Carbon Trust and Energy 4 Impact. The grant is being used to test Sunsafe with a particular focus on retailers and technicians, the people who ultimately install and maintain the solar systems businesses like Justus’s and the Makueni Cooperative rely on.

It is these experiences that a team of ten rural enumerators, five from Makueni and five from Machakos, is preparing to document at scale.

For enumerator Neema, who took part in both the classroom training and the early field visits to businesses like Justus’s workshop, the two experiences have reinforced each other.

“Our interaction with the Sunsafe team has taught us a lot about solar that enables us to better understand the businesses we are visiting,” she says. “You can clearly understand how productive use of solar allows them to keep the business running in moments of power interruption.”

Why Strathmore is in the field

The exercise is the latest phase of Sunsafe’s research, following an earlier study focused on households. This phase shifts the focus to small and medium-sized enterprises, examining how businesses access and use both solar and grid electricity, and how those energy choices shape their day-to-day operations.

“We aim to ensure that access to quality energy also translates to productive economies that are good for the community,” says Eng. Anne Wambugu, Sunsafe founder and researcher, speaking during the enumerators’ training in Wote.

She notes that Sunsafe’s household-level research had already surfaced valuable insights into how Kenyans finance and adopt solar technology. The SME-focused phase is meant to build on that foundation. “For Sunsafe as a startup and solar sizing tool to work, we need to take into account realities on the ground,” she adds.

Getting the training right

Before any enumerator could knock on a business owner’s door, the team spent three intensive days learning how to administer the Productive Use of Energy (PUE) and Small Business Survey and a companion survey for rural institutions.  Training covered informed consent, digital data collection using KoboCollect, GPS mapping, technical observation of energy systems, and interviewing techniques.

A recurring challenge was translation, not just between languages, but between technical and everyday concepts.

“We are learning how best to approach the survey, considering that we will be meeting busy small business owners and employees,” says enumerator Jackline. “We are learning how to simplify explanations and explain to them the benefit of participating.” 

Her colleague Pascal says the team worked carefully through the survey instrument itself, translating questions into Kiswahili and relevant local languages to ensure nothing would be lost or misunderstood in the field.

That preparation was put to the test when the enumerators left the classroom to pilot the survey with businesses in Wote, including Justus’s workshop and the Makueni Cooperative. The exercise offered an early glimpse of the varied experiences the wider data collection is likely to uncover. 

Turning Field Data into a Better Solar Tool 

For the Sunsafe team, the exercise is about more than documentation. Joseph, a data analyst on the project, says the researchers want to capture the entire solar journey, from the decision to invest to the day-to-day experience of using the system. 

“We are keen on understanding the entire user experience of those using solar, from what led them to make the move, how they purchased the system, installed it and how it generally serves them day to day,” he explains.

That information, he says, will directly shape the Sunsafe application, making it more responsive to the realities of the businesses it’s meant to serve.

As the enumerators fan out across Makueni and Machakos, every workshop, cooperative and rural institution will add another piece to the picture of how businesses experience energy. 

Ultimately, the research could help answer whether solar can keep rural businesses running and how far that power can travel through the communities that depend on them. 

Article written by Victor Anyura