SUCHITOTO, El Salvador, Jul 25 (IPS) – A brand new know-how that has arrived in rural villages in El Salvador makes it attainable for small farming households to generate biogas with their feces and use it for cooking – one thing that initially sounded to them like science fiction and likewise a bit smelly.
Within the countryside, composting latrines, which separate urine from feces to provide natural fertilizer, are extremely popular. However can they actually produce fuel for cooking?
“It appeared unimaginable to me,” Marisol Menjívar advised IPS as she defined how her biodigester, which is a part of a system that features a bathroom and a range, was put in within the yard of her home within the village of El Corozal, close to Suchitoto, a municipality within the central Salvadoran division of Cuscatlán.
“When the primary ones have been put in right here, I used to be excited to see that that they had stoves connected, and I requested if I may have one too,” added Marisol, 48. Hers was put in in March.
El Corozal, inhabitants 200, is certainly one of eight rural settlements that make up the Laura López Rural Water and Sanitation Affiliation (Arall), a neighborhood group chargeable for offering water to 465 native households.
The households within the small villages, who’re devoted to the cultivation of corn and beans, needed to flee the area in the course of the nation’s 1980-1992 civil conflict, as a result of preventing.
After the armed battle, they returned to rebuild their lives and work collectively to supply fundamental providers, particularly consuming water, as have many different neighborhood organizations, within the absence of presidency protection.
On this Central American nation of 6.7 million inhabitants, 78.4 % of rural households have entry to piped water, whereas 10.8 % are equipped by wells and 10.7 % by different means.
Easy inexperienced know-how
The biodigester program in rural areas is being promoted by the Salvadoran Water Authority (Asa).
Since November 2022, the federal government company has put in round 500 of those techniques freed from cost in a number of villages across the nation.
The purpose is to allow small farmers to provide sustainable power, biogas for free of charge, which boosts their earnings and residing requirements, whereas on the identical time enhancing the setting.
This system gives every household with a equipment that features a biodigester, a biotoilet, and a small one-burner range.
In El Corozal, 5 of those kits have been put in by Asa in November 2022, to see if individuals would settle for them or not. Thus far, 21 have been delivered, and there’s a ready record for extra.
“With the primary ones have been arrange, the thought was for individuals to see how they labored, as a result of there was lots of ignorance and even worry,” Arall’s president, Enrique Menjívar, advised IPS.
In El Corozal there are lots of households with the surname Menjívar, due to the custom of shut family members placing down roots in the identical place.
“Right here we’re virtually all associated,” Enrique added.
The biodigester is a hermetically sealed polyethylene bag, 2.10 meters lengthy, 1.15 meters broad and 1.30 meters excessive, inside which micro organism decompose feces or different natural supplies.
This course of generates biogas, clear power that’s used to gas the stoves.
The bathrooms are mounted on a one-meter-high cement slab in latrines within the yard. They’re fabricated from porcelain and have a deal with on one facet that opens and closes the stool inlet gap.
Additionally they have a small hand pump, just like those used to inflate bicycle tires, and when the deal with is pushed, water is pumped from a bucket to flush the waste down the pipe.
The underground pipe carries the biomass by gravity to the biodigester, situated about 5 meters away.
The system can be fed with natural waste, via a tube with a gap at one finish, which should be opened and closed.
As soon as it has been produced, the biogas is piped by way of a steel tube to the small range mounted inside the home.
“I do not even use matches, I simply flip the knob and it lights up,” mentioned Marisol, a homemaker and caregiver. Her husband Manuel Menjívar is a subsistence farmer, they usually have a younger daughter.
In El Corozal, biodigesters have been put in for households of 4 or 5 members, and the gear generates 300 liters of biogas in the course of the night time, sufficient to make use of for 2 hours a day, in accordance with the technical specs of Coenergy, the corporate that imports and markets the gadgets.
However there are additionally kits which might be utilized by two associated households who reside subsequent to one another and share the gear, which incorporates, along with the bathroom, a bigger biodigester and a two-burner range.
With extra subtle gear, electrical energy could possibly be generated from biogas produced from landfill waste or farm manure, though this isn’t but being accomplished in El Salvador.
Saving cash whereas caring for the setting
The households of El Corozal who’ve the brand new latrines and stoves are pleased with the outcomes.
What they worth probably the most is saving cash by cooking with fuel produced by themselves, for free of charge.
They used to prepare dinner on wood-burning stoves, within the case of meals that took longer to make, or on liquefied fuel stoves, at a value of 13 {dollars} per fuel cylinder.
Marleni Menjívar, for instance, used two cylinders a month, primarily due to the excessive degree of consumption demanded by the household enterprise of constructing artisanal cheeses, together with a extremely popular native form of cottage cheese.
Day by day she has to prepare dinner 23 liters of whey, the liquid left after milk has been curdled. This consumes the biogas produced in a single day.
For meals in the course of the day Marleni nonetheless makes use of the liquefied fuel range, however now she solely buys one cylinder a month as a substitute of two, a financial savings of about 13 {dollars} per thirty days.
“These financial savings are vital for households right here within the countryside,” mentioned Marleni, 28, the mom of a four-year-old lady. The remainder of her household is made up of her brother and grandfather.
“We additionally save water,” she added.
The biotoilet requires only one.2 liters of water per flush, lower than standard bathrooms.
As well as, the soils are protected against contamination by septic tank latrines, that are broadly utilized in rural areas, however are leaky and unhygienic.
The brand new know-how avoids these issues.
The liquids ensuing from the decomposition course of move by way of an underground pipe right into a pit that capabilities as a filter, with a number of layers of gravel and sand. This prevents air pollution of the soil and aquifers.
Additionally, as a by-product of the decomposition course of, natural liquid fertilizer is produced to be used on crops.
Checking on website: zero stench
Resulting from a ignorance, individuals have been initially involved that if the biogas used within the stoves got here from the decomposition of the household’s feces, it will in all probability stink.
And, worst of all, maybe the meals would additionally scent.
However little by little these doubts and fears light away as households noticed how the primary gadgets labored.
“That was the very first thing they requested, if the fuel smelled dangerous, or if what we have been cooking smelled dangerous,” mentioned Marleni, remembering how the neighbors got here to her home to test for themselves when she received the latrine and range put in in December 2022.
“That was due to the little info that was accessible, however then we discovered that this was not the case, our doubts have been cleared up and we noticed there have been no odors,” she added.
She mentioned that, like virtually everybody within the village, her household used to have a dry composting bathroom, but it surely stank and generated cockroaches and flies.
“All that has been eradicated, the loos are utterly hygienic and clear, and we even had them tiled to make them look nicer,” Marleni mentioned.
She remarked that hygiene is vital to her, as her little lady can now go to the lavatory by herself, with out worrying about cockroaches and flies.
© Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service
