Indians bag Green Oscar for biogas, human power

Indian enterprises have won two of the five Ashden Awards for sustainable energy for 2006, popularly known as Green Oscars and a cash prize of 30,000 pounds each.

Indian enterprises have won two of the five Ashden Awards for sustainable energy for 2006, popularly known as Green Oscars and a cash prize of 30,000 pounds each.

The organisations which have won the award include Appropriate Technology Institute (AARTI), Pune, for the design of a revolutionary biogas system that generates gas for cooking from food waste and other sugary and starchy material.

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SMART BOX

Eco wise • A biogas system that generates   gas for cooking from food waste • Treadle pumps that use human    power to pump water from      wells/lakes allowing farmers to     grow crops round the year • Using slurry as a powerful    fertiliser using new and    traditional techniques

The other is International Development Enterprises of India (IDEI) which has been behind the manufacture and distribution of 510,000 treadle pumps — a simple device that uses human power to pump water from wells, streams and lakes up onto the fields allowing farmers to grow crops all the year round.

Besides, Vivekananda Kendra and Nardep, bagged the second prize of 10,000 pounds for making biogas designs which generate gas for cooking and developed effective ways of using slurry as a powerful fertiliser using new and traditional techniques.

Lord May of Oxford, a former Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK government, presented the awards to Anand Karve of AARTI and Amitabha Sadangi, Executive Director of IDEI at the Royal Geographical Society in London on Thursday night.