Teen innovators in Kenya turn farm waste into award-winning vehicle exhaust filter

Teen innovators in Kenya turn farm waste into award-winning vehicle exhaust filter

NAIROBI — Two 17-year-old students from Kiambu county in Kenya were declared winners of the Africa region Earth Prize on May 12, for a low-cost maize- and coconut-based vehicle exhaust filtration system they developed. Fredrick Njoroge Kariuki and Miron Onsarigo, students at M-PESA Foundation Academy, developed the system, HewaSafi, meaning “clean air” in Swahili, after watching friends and family suffer from diseases linked to air pollution. Th…

17-year-olds from Kenya named Africa Winners for maize-based vehicle exhaust filter

In an effort to tackle rising air pollution in African urban areas, 17-year-olds Fredrick Njoroge Kariuki and Miron Onsarigo from Kenya were named as the African Winners of The Earth Prize 2026. Their solution, HewaSafi (meaning ‘clean air’ in Swahili), is a low-cost vehicle exhaust system that captures harmful emissions using filters made from maize, agricultural waste, disposed batteries, coconut shells and algae. They won USD100,000 prize.  T…