Biogas: Energy problem solution in India

Biogas plant: Energy problem solution in India

A company in southern India has come up with a viable way for poor households to help themselves.

The locally-made biogas plant, filled with bacteria found in the stomachs of cows, silently and odorlessly converts food waste and into gas.

More than 20,000 homes in Kerala have installed the hand made plant, and the money they save pays off the machine in less than three years.

Their home cooking, they say, tastes all the better for its green credentials.

Al Jazeera's Tarek Bazley reports from Thiruvananthapuram, India, on a solution in India that's got plenty of merit when it comes to powering homes in areas of the developing world often beset by power cuts.


Biogas solution in India by aljazeeraenglish

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Manacaud school too gets biogas plant

The City Corporation has set up a biogas plant at the Karthika Thirunal Vocational Higher Secondary School, Manacaud, and it was inaugurated on Friday by Mayor K Chandrika. The plant has been installed at a cost of ` 4.84 lakh under a Kerala Sustainable Urban Development Project (KSUDP) scheme.
Ever since the garbage crisis hit the city six months back, the Corporation has been encouraging schools and other institutions to install biogas plants on their compounds. Many schools, including Cotton Hill GHSS and Pattom GHSS, have come forward for this and work is progressing on the biogas plants in these institutions.
Manacaud VHSS has around 3,000 students and the plant has the capacity to treat 150 kg of bio-degradable waste each day. ‘’The plant will produce energy that could be used as fuel for a continuous six hours. We have already conducted a trial and in the last one week the school canteen has been working on the energy from the plant for 5 hours,’’ said a KSUDP official.
The expenses for setting up the plant include the two-year operational cost too. ‘’This is a model, we want more schools to come forward and do the same so that children are taught the rules of waste disposal, energy saving and litter-free environment,’’ said Pushpalatha, Health Standing Committee Chairperson.
The inaugural ceremony was also attended by  Deputy Mayor G Happykumar and Standing Committee chairpersons Palayam Rajan and K S Sheela.
Under the KSUDP project, SMV School in the city was the first to take to biogas plant some time back. Cotton Hill and Pattom GHSS would also have the plant up and operational in a few weeks.
Kannammoola bund colony and Rajaji Nagar colony (Chenkalchoolah) are the two other spots where biogas plants will soon come up.
Meanwhile, more wards are warming up to the idea of installing a biogas plant at a certain institution or school in their respective limits, Health officials said.

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