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Protecting the Mountain Gorillas of Virunga
The need for speed when drying briquettes: Makeshift Greenhouses in Virunga
March has gone by and 50 fuel briquette pressing machines are now fully operational on the ground around the Gorilla Sector for our pilot Fuel Briquette Program. April will see 80 new further machines installed and put to work, and thereafter, 100 more briquette pressing machines every subsequent month, until we reach the 1,000 goal by the end of 2009. This is all of course largely thanks to your donations and will also be helped by briquette sales revenue.
In the surrounding areas of the southern sector of Virunga National Park, briquette machines are being installed, and villagers are given training and support for 6 months. Moreover, we buy their full production on a weekly basis. Apart from a wooden pressing machine and all its accessories we donate, we are now adding the construction of a greenhouse for every 3 groups, so they can easily dry their fuel briquettes. Rainfall is high, heavy and intense in this part of the world - and can ruin your briquettes if you are not careful.
Jean Bosco checking on the first greenhouse built in Rumangabo station. Fuel briquettes now dry in 4 days maximum, whilst before it could take up to 2 weeks to get the same result!
We are not property developers, but have started building several greenhouses of 2, 75 mts. wide x 6 mts. long x 2 mts. high, using local bamboo, 1 kilo of nails and 36 meters of transparent plastic, totaling USD 108 each.
Rumangabo chief warden Conservateur Kanamaharagi visiting the greenhouse with the Minister of Environment during the day of the school inauguration.
Fuel briquette sacks being unloaded today at our greenhouse in Goma.
So you can see that we are constantly trying to improve the briquette production process - we need to strive to make this the best alternative possible to charcoal so we can prevent the destruction of Virunga’s forests.
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RECENT DONATIONS
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Unregistered Donor 25 $ - 02 Sep 2010Support the Gorilla Orphans
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02 Sep 2010Open donation
Caroline 50 $ -
02 Sep 20104 x Briquette Program
Brenda W 120 $ -
02 Sep 2010Open donation
Ryan B 40 $ - 02 Sep 2010Patrol Rations
Unregistered Donor 15 $ - 02 Sep 2010Protecting Park Area 178
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Zoe M 25 $ - 02 Sep 2010Protecting Park Area 116
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Gemma 10 $ - 30 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 45
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Alexandra S 60 $ - 30 Aug 2010Open donation
Unregistered Donor 25 $ -
29 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 212
Helmut Albert P 25 $ - 29 Aug 2010Open donation
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Juli&Family R 10 $ - 28 Aug 2010Briquette Program
Liz W 12 $ - 28 Aug 2010 Guarding a Gorilla
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Louise M 25 $ - 28 Aug 2010Support the Gorilla Orphans
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28 Aug 2010Open donation
Vikki W 10 $ - 28 Aug 2010Ranger Patrols
Unregistered Donor 25 $ - 27 Aug 2010Patrol Rations
Caroline 15 $ - 27 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 20
Jessica 25 $ - 27 Aug 2010Salary Supplement for a Ranger
Unregistered Donor 40 $ - 27 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 179
Caroline 25 $ -
27 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 71
Bernard B 25 $ - 27 Aug 2010Open donation
Unregistered Donor 40 $ - 26 Aug 2010Fuel for Patrols
Unregistered Donor 10 $ - 26 Aug 2010Briquette Program
Unregistered Donor 20 $ - 25 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 141
Unregistered Donor 25 $ - 25 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 206
Ryan B 25 $ - 25 Aug 2010Support the Gorilla Orphans
Unregistered Donor 10 $ - 25 Aug 2010Open donation
Unregistered Donor 10 $ -
25 Aug 2010 Guarding a Gorilla
Brenton H 10 $ -
25 Aug 2010 Guarding a Gorilla
Theresa S 10 $ -
25 Aug 2010Ranger Patrols
Janie P 25 $ - 25 Aug 2010 Multiple items
Unregistered Donor 107 $ - 25 Aug 2010Protecting Park Area 22
Unregistered Donor 25 $ - 24 Aug 2010Support the Gorilla Orphans
Unregistered Donor 10 $ - 24 Aug 2010 Guarding a Gorilla
Unregistered Donor 10 $ - 24 Aug 2010 Multiple items
Unregistered Donor 95 $ - 23 Aug 2010Open donation
Unregistered Donor 10 $
- 03 Sep 2010Protecting Park Area 50
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News from Congo- Suspected rebels rape over 240 women in DR Congo: NGO - AFP
- Congo Mass Rape Numbers Rise To 240: UN Report - Huffington Post (blog)
- Will United Nations Cover-Up Rwanda’s Congo Genocide? - Black Star News
- Soco Falls After Nganga Well Finds Water-Bearing Sands in Congo - Bloomberg
- Congo Gives Rights to Two First Quantum Mines to Hong Kong-Based Company - Bloomberg
- MagIndustries Update on Potash Investment Agreement with Republic of Congo - MarketWatch (press release)
- UN Delays Release of Report on Possible Congo Genocide - New York Times
- UK complicit in bankrolling Congo conflict - The Guardian
- River Of Life - Congo Odyssey - NPR
- Congo rapes worse than reported - Salon
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12 Responses to “The need for speed when drying briquettes: Makeshift Greenhouses in Virunga”
Hey Virginia! I’m always glad to learn about the innovations and progress you’re making with this project. It’s really awesome.
s.
Yes. Congratulations Virginia and team on a job well done so far. Working in the field is no easy task, let alone with a new product, heavy equipment to transport, and a major challenge ahead.
Great work! All that experimenting as you’ve mentioned on your blog is well worth it!
As always truly inspiring project and growing from stronger and bigger all the time!
Best wishes to all.
Great job Virginia and all the briquette team! Obviously much hard work and determination is going into this immensely important project. Let’s hope we can all help to get the 1,000 presses working by end of 2009….
Impressive…the greenhouse and all these sacks of briquettes. My impression is that you are making very good on this project.
I have two questions: You mention the revenue from the briquette sales. Where do you sell the briquettes? How is the response of the customers esspecially regarding the efficiency of the briquettes vs. charcoal? Are the briquettes accepted by the local communities?
Briquettes have a great future if they can be more convenient (les smoke), equally effective and maybe a little cheaper than charcoal.
Mark
Impressive…the greenhouse and all these sacks of briquettes. My impression is that you are making very good on this project.
I have two questions: You mention the revenue from the briquette sales. Where do you sell the briquettes? How is the response of the customers esspecially regarding the efficiency of the briquettes vs. charcoal? Are the briquettes accepted by the local communities?
Briquettes have a great future if they can be more convenient (less smoke?), equally effective and maybe a little cheaper than charcoal.
Mark
Well done Virginia!
Most impressed with your teams architectural skills and know how.
Keep up the good work - you’ll soon have Virunga hooked on your briquettes! Have you thought about franchising out the business, to local communities, to help create new income and wean them off charcoal?
Promising news Virginia. Congratulations on the continued success and expansion of the project. Hopefully it won’t be long before briquettes replace charcoal completely. What a great project for the community and for Virunga!
Dear All, as always, thank you so much for leaving such positive comments and ideas!
Mark, fuel briquettes will be inserted in the refugee camps end of this week. They have been purchased through a WWF emergency fund and I will be posting about this very shortly. We are also looking at working together with 20 local associations, which are currently distributing improved stoves in the village of Goma. The idea is they start selling the fuel briquettes together with the stoves.
The revenues of such sales will allow us to re-invest on this project, assuring a constant purchase of all villager’s production. They are getting very good at it and production is getting ready fast! So we need to move fast too!
[...] like to read more about this project you can read about greenhouses used for drying briquettes here, and how we access remote areas to provide briquette training and employment here. In the blog [...]
I would like to know what are the briquettes made of, and the process by which they are made.
[...] first attempt to get the fuel briquettes dried faster was to create a makeshift greenhouse, using transparent plastic and local bamboo. For our fuel briquette program, this proved to be very [...]