BIOGAS:

Cheap, Clean, Reliable, Renewable Energy

Dung is a cheap source of energy on which both African rural and urban populations can rely. It provides 100% clean energy to its users, and switching is fast and easy. You will still get the same power per gas molecule with much less trouble, while building a healthier, more sustainable community every time you turn on your gas cooker.

By Azore Opio

Developing a highly productive biogas resource has strategic value for Africa’s rural poor. Interest in biogas as a source of renewable energy is increasingly becoming widely accepted as a potential staple for many energy needs.

In 2012, the UN estimated that by 2030, some 900 million people worldwide would still have no access to electricity, about 3 million would still be using traditional cooking fuels and nearly 30 million would have died of smoke-related diseases. And much of the world’s remaining forests would have been hewn for firewood.

A substantial part of Cameroon’s population relies on small cooking gas supply, especially in urban areas. Such supplies serve communities that are frequently short on money. In the rural areas, cooking gas is a luxury, if not absent. The population, therefore, depends mainly on wood for energy supplies.

Roseline Mbisiri, a resident of Ntenefor on the outskirts of Bamenda City, has worked out her way out of energy poverty by adopting biogas energy production.

“Since I started using biogas energy fuelled by dung from the cow that Heifer International gave me, I have never suffered any energy shortage,” Mbisiri told The Green Vision at her home in Water Tank quarter.

She uses the biogas energy to cook and heat up her poultry house.

“I also use the sludge from my biogas plant as manure for my vegetable garden and maize farm,” Mibisiri said.

“It is such a huge relief for us. We no longer have to cut or buy firewood,” said Wanka Williams, Mbisiri’s husband who is also a biogas technician.

Wanka received training from Heifer International and SNV.

Apart from rearing chicken and vegetable gardening, Mbisiri also grows mushrooms and produces yoghurt from the mild provided by the Heifer cow.