Visual Project Management | Grant Work: The Power of Poo: Biogas_Paskova_002

A road snakes through Kigali, Rwanda on November 19, 2017. The land-locked African nation relies on hydropower and wood-burning for its energy, emissions from which combine with automotive and bike exhaust to form a blanket of pollution. While Rwanda is making an effort to source more climate-friendly fuels, the country has already experienced temperature increases higher than the global average, which are projected to continue to rise by 2.5 degrees C from its 1970 temperatures, by the 2050s. Nearly half of all Rwandans live in poverty, relying on small-scale farming for survival without gas or electricity. With so many women and children spending hours of the day foraging for wood used for cooking and light, often damaging their eyes, lungs, the forests and atmosphere, a little inventiveness helps. Enter cow and enter pig -- not just as a source of food, but also the heat needed to cook it. Or more specifically, their poo -- the fuel fed to a biogas digester, a tank that converts organic waste into methane.

A road snakes through Kigali, Rwanda on November 19, 2017. The land-locked African nation relies on hydropower and wood-burning for its energy, emissions from which combine with automotive and bike exhaust to form a blanket of pollution. While Rwanda is making an effort to source more climate-friendly fuels, the country has already experienced temperature increases higher than the global average, which are projected to continue to rise by 2.5 degrees C from its 1970 temperatures, by the 2050s.  

Nearly half of all Rwandans live in poverty, relying on small-scale farming for survival without gas or electricity. With so many women and children spending hours of the day foraging for wood used for cooking and light, often damaging their eyes, lungs, the forests and atmosphere, a little inventiveness helps. Enter cow and enter pig -- not just as a source of food, but also the heat needed to cook it. Or more specifically, their poo -- the fuel fed to a biogas digester, a tank that converts organic waste into methane.