Dutch multinational oil group Rompetrol, also known as TRG, has entered the biofuel market in France in conjunction with its French subsidiary Dyneff. It hopes to equip approximately 30 filling stations to provide superethanol E85 distribution to French consumers by the end of 2007.
Cleaning up Kinshasa by introducing biogas
The people of Kinshasa, Africa's second largest and fastest growing megapolis, used to proudly call their city Kin la Belle ('Kinshasa the Beautiful') but after years of neglect, they now disparage it as Kin la Poubelle ('Kinshasa the Dustbin').
But the confluence of a series of factors has opened new perspectives. Energy is becoming increasingly expensive in this strange city, where urban and rural logics have become intertwined. As rural populations become urbanites, they bring their habits from the country-side, and, instead of abandoning them in favor of 'modern' urban practises, they create their own village in the city. This so-called 'villagisation' of one of the world's mega-cities, has astonished many an anthropologist. Urban farming, tribal affiliations, magic, sorcery, traditional healing methods and rural household economics have become inseparable from the hip modernity that is typical of Kinshasa.
This villagisation also implies that millions of Kinois in the slums keep using fuel wood for their daily heating and cooking needs. All trees within a radius of dozens of kilometres of Kinshasa have been cut, and the expansion continues as Congo's capital grows. The result of this expansion and the lack of both electricity in the slums and of cleaner fuels (like kerosene and LPG, which are expensive) is a dramatic scarcity of fuel. Almost all large and rapidly growing cities in the huge country are facing the same problems as "Kin La Poubelle".
Writing in the Belgian Embassy's sectoral publication entitled Eau, Energie, Environnement et Agriculture professor Monzambe Mapunzu of the Department of Agronomic and Veterinary Sciences of the Université Pédagogique Nationale explains that the production of biogas from municipal solid waste can go a long way in cleaning up Congo's towns while providing a clean source of energy. Moreover, the technology could boost rural populations' access to energy and help motorise farmers' activities, resulting in higher productivity. Biogas production can also be integrated in soil enhancement strategies. Lack of clean and durable energy supplies is a major factor of underdevelopment and poverty amongst these populations:
bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: municipal solid waste :: public health :: energy scarcity :: fuel wood :: biogas :: rural development :: electrification :: Kinshasa :: Congo ::
Monzambe says that, despite Congo's large potential energy reserves (hydropower, biofuels), the level of electrification in the country is one of the lowest on the African continent: barely 6%. Biogas offers a relatively simple, proven and reliable technology to tackle both the waste management problem in the cities as well as the lack of modern energy in the country-side.
Energy and rural development
"The diagnosis of rural development points to a deep poverty amongst populations. Decentralised and autonomous energy production, relying on the biomethanation of agricultural residues and urban solid waste can solve different problems at once: biogas can replace the use of fuel wood especially in zones that suffer under erosion, desertification and deforestation, as is the case in the peripheries around large cities; biogas can facilitate the development of small-scale agricultural motorisation (pumps, refrigerators, harvesting, transporting of crops, etc...) and can contribute to increasing agricultural productivity; biogas production can increase the fertility of soils by utilising the residues from the methanised organic matter, which make for an excellent green fertiliser".
Biogas production in the cities can help mitigate the health hazards arising from accumulating waste. During the biomethanation of waste, the anaerobic digester eliminates more than 90% of the pathogenic bacteria contained in waste, and between 90 and 100% of intestinal worms and between 35 and 100% of their eggs. In short, anaerobic digestion has the potential to reduce organic, microbial, olfactive and aesthetic pollution.
Waste management in the cities
With its urbanisation level of 30% and an average population growth of 3.3% per annum (the largest in Africa), its growing rural exodus as a result of numerous conflicts since 1963 until this day, the urban zones of Congo are becoming rapidly overpopulated. These social and demographic developments occur without any clear planning or coherent policy framework: the State doesn't provide appropriate housing for the swelling populations, new quarters are being established without any urban planning and in disregard of the most basic public health considerations (sewers, public latrines, green spaces and facilities for young people, energy and water infrastructures, roads, etc...).
According to professor Monzambe, there is a clear correlation between the demographic explosion in Congo, the production of waste and the degradation of the environment. This comes down to the basic observation that rising consumption results in growing waste streams that require appropriate management strategies. Monzambe calculated that each individual produces around 0.5kg of faecal waste, 1kg of municipal waste and 194 liters of liquid waste per day. 8 million Kinois therefor produce 4000 tons of human waste, 8000 tons of municipal solid waste and 1.552 billion liters of waste water. This huge and unmanaged stream of waste pollutes large pockets of the city, even markets where food is sold, and transforms the many canals and streams into open sewers.
Today in Kinshasa, waste is not only undermanaged but left to decompose in the open air way too long. This has become the prime cause of the resurgence of diseases like cholera and typhoid, and of respiratory diseases. Biogas production again seems to be the most appropriate technology to deal with the problem, certainly given its potential to supply energy, a scarce resource in the cities.
Translated by Laurens Rademakers
More information:
Le Potential, via AllAfrica: Congo-Kinshasa: Développement durable, l'industrie du biogaz, une réponse à la pollution des déchets dans les villes congolaises - May 2, 2007 (original article).
Click to open slide-show on 'Kin la Poubelle'
The waste problem in the city of 8 million has become so dramatic that it even became a topic during the recent presidential elections. Wars, corruption, dictators who only mind their own clan, the collapse of social and municipal services, lack of planning and stubborn habits of the city's swelling population have led to a management challenge so immense and smelly that nobody has the courage to tackle it. Meanwhile, the accumulating waste has become a health hazard responsible for the return of water-borne diseases like typhoid and cholera, for respiratory diseases and for water pollution.But the confluence of a series of factors has opened new perspectives. Energy is becoming increasingly expensive in this strange city, where urban and rural logics have become intertwined. As rural populations become urbanites, they bring their habits from the country-side, and, instead of abandoning them in favor of 'modern' urban practises, they create their own village in the city. This so-called 'villagisation' of one of the world's mega-cities, has astonished many an anthropologist. Urban farming, tribal affiliations, magic, sorcery, traditional healing methods and rural household economics have become inseparable from the hip modernity that is typical of Kinshasa.
This villagisation also implies that millions of Kinois in the slums keep using fuel wood for their daily heating and cooking needs. All trees within a radius of dozens of kilometres of Kinshasa have been cut, and the expansion continues as Congo's capital grows. The result of this expansion and the lack of both electricity in the slums and of cleaner fuels (like kerosene and LPG, which are expensive) is a dramatic scarcity of fuel. Almost all large and rapidly growing cities in the huge country are facing the same problems as "Kin La Poubelle".
Writing in the Belgian Embassy's sectoral publication entitled Eau, Energie, Environnement et Agriculture professor Monzambe Mapunzu of the Department of Agronomic and Veterinary Sciences of the Université Pédagogique Nationale explains that the production of biogas from municipal solid waste can go a long way in cleaning up Congo's towns while providing a clean source of energy. Moreover, the technology could boost rural populations' access to energy and help motorise farmers' activities, resulting in higher productivity. Biogas production can also be integrated in soil enhancement strategies. Lack of clean and durable energy supplies is a major factor of underdevelopment and poverty amongst these populations:
bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: municipal solid waste :: public health :: energy scarcity :: fuel wood :: biogas :: rural development :: electrification :: Kinshasa :: Congo ::Monzambe says that, despite Congo's large potential energy reserves (hydropower, biofuels), the level of electrification in the country is one of the lowest on the African continent: barely 6%. Biogas offers a relatively simple, proven and reliable technology to tackle both the waste management problem in the cities as well as the lack of modern energy in the country-side.
Energy and rural development
"The diagnosis of rural development points to a deep poverty amongst populations. Decentralised and autonomous energy production, relying on the biomethanation of agricultural residues and urban solid waste can solve different problems at once: biogas can replace the use of fuel wood especially in zones that suffer under erosion, desertification and deforestation, as is the case in the peripheries around large cities; biogas can facilitate the development of small-scale agricultural motorisation (pumps, refrigerators, harvesting, transporting of crops, etc...) and can contribute to increasing agricultural productivity; biogas production can increase the fertility of soils by utilising the residues from the methanised organic matter, which make for an excellent green fertiliser".
Biogas production in the cities can help mitigate the health hazards arising from accumulating waste. During the biomethanation of waste, the anaerobic digester eliminates more than 90% of the pathogenic bacteria contained in waste, and between 90 and 100% of intestinal worms and between 35 and 100% of their eggs. In short, anaerobic digestion has the potential to reduce organic, microbial, olfactive and aesthetic pollution.
Waste management in the cities
With its urbanisation level of 30% and an average population growth of 3.3% per annum (the largest in Africa), its growing rural exodus as a result of numerous conflicts since 1963 until this day, the urban zones of Congo are becoming rapidly overpopulated. These social and demographic developments occur without any clear planning or coherent policy framework: the State doesn't provide appropriate housing for the swelling populations, new quarters are being established without any urban planning and in disregard of the most basic public health considerations (sewers, public latrines, green spaces and facilities for young people, energy and water infrastructures, roads, etc...).
According to professor Monzambe, there is a clear correlation between the demographic explosion in Congo, the production of waste and the degradation of the environment. This comes down to the basic observation that rising consumption results in growing waste streams that require appropriate management strategies. Monzambe calculated that each individual produces around 0.5kg of faecal waste, 1kg of municipal waste and 194 liters of liquid waste per day. 8 million Kinois therefor produce 4000 tons of human waste, 8000 tons of municipal solid waste and 1.552 billion liters of waste water. This huge and unmanaged stream of waste pollutes large pockets of the city, even markets where food is sold, and transforms the many canals and streams into open sewers.
Today in Kinshasa, waste is not only undermanaged but left to decompose in the open air way too long. This has become the prime cause of the resurgence of diseases like cholera and typhoid, and of respiratory diseases. Biogas production again seems to be the most appropriate technology to deal with the problem, certainly given its potential to supply energy, a scarce resource in the cities.
Translated by Laurens Rademakers
More information:
Le Potential, via AllAfrica: Congo-Kinshasa: Développement durable, l'industrie du biogaz, une réponse à la pollution des déchets dans les villes congolaises - May 2, 2007 (original article).
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