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Danish company fuelling a cleaner future in Uganda

Christian Wenande
August 26th, 2016


This article is more than 8 years old.

C F Nielsen looking to turn everyday food waste into a usable and more sustainable energy source

The briquette machine has great potential (photo: C F Nielsen)

C F Nielsen, a small company from north Jutland, is developing a machine that can turn everyday food waste into a usable and more sustainable form of fuel that can be used for cooking.

The plan is to try it out next year in Kampala, Uganda, which – like many other developing nations – is heavily reliant on wood and coal as energy sources, much to the detriment of the surrounding environment and forest ecosystems.

“We need to stop the deforestation,” Mogens Slot Knudsen, the head of C F Nielsen, told DR Nyheder.

“What we do here is use waste products from agriculture or other areas so people don’t need to chop down trees and forests.”

READ MORE: South African wine workers call for Danish boycott

Waste to fuel
Through the process of ‘briquetting’ – a process in which raw materials are compressed under high pressure to form a round or square briquette – the company produces small blocks of material that can be used for heating purposes.

Anything from corn stalks, both peanut shells and sugar cane refuse can be transformed into an alternative for other unsustainable fuel sources.

The new briquette machine has been helped along via the support of Access2innovation, a collection of civil organisations, companies, research centres and authorities dedicated to generating sustainable projects and solutions abroad.

(photo: C F Nielsen)

(photo: C F Nielsen)


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”