Real life hero: MBA burns pine needles light up 1000 homes

In the summer of 2012 a series of forest fires ravaged the woodlands of Uttarakhand causing mass destruction of life and property According to newspaper reports 2808 hectares of forests were burnt down mdash more than 80 per cent due to the dry and easily inflammable pine needles that helped the fire spread rapidly A year later the entire Kumaon region of the state is bristling with hope and excitement Why Rajnish Jainrsquos master plan of using pine needles to generate electricity and charcoal and thereby cleanse the forest floor of the pine cones and reduce chances of forest fires finally seems underway Imagingu00a0Dharmeshu00a0Rathod Life in the mountains Jain who moved to the Pittoragarh district of Uttarakhandrsquos Kumaon region with his wife in 1997 set up a voluntary organisation Avani two years later to help the backward and impoverished villagers and the society at large ldquoWhen we moved here most villages in the region were not connected to the power grid So solar power was a good option for household lighting As we wanted people to participate in the programme financially we realised that increasing per capita income was the only solution to bring affordable lighting to their doorstep which sent us in the direction of working with textiles a traditional skill in the areardquo says Jain who did his MBA from Lucknow Rajnish Jain It wasnrsquot long before he realised though that something had to be done about the menace of the annual forest fires that wrecked havoc in the lives of the villagers ldquoThe recurrent fires spread by pine needles littered during dry summer months were destroying the biodiversity of the area and affecting the supply of fuel wood water fodder herbs and timberrdquo says the 52yearold The fires incidentally affect the lives of over 12 million people in the central Himalayas alone which ultimately has an impact on several commodity prices hurting the pockets of even affluent urban citizens ldquoThis combined with the lack of dependable electricity is seriously inhibiting the development of facilities and economic growth forcing young men to migrate to earn cash incomes fragmenting families and burdening urban centresrdquo Jain elucidatesu00a0 He tells us the story of Basanti Devi who lives in Balta village with her husband and three children She walks four miles every day to collect fuel wood before she can cook a meal for her family Her family does not have a permanent source of income and their very existence is at stake ldquoDitto for the over 10 million others in the central Himalayan regionrdquo says Jain u00a0While the fire destroys the life around her Basanti Devi wonders whether all this energy could be used to meet her familyrsquos energy needs her woes would come to an end But she knows that she canrsquot do this on her own as pine needles are highly flammable This is where Jainrsquos innovative use of the gasifier could change her lifeu00a0 Dry pine needles which cover the forest in summer are one of the main causes of the annual forest fires in the Central Himalayan region of Kumaon Some nights the fire gets so bad that u00a0 community members must make fire lines to stop it from spreading pics courtesy Rajnish Jain Letrsquos stop the fire Jain had his lightbulb moment at a renewable energy conference he attended in 2005 Listening to one expert deliberate on alternative sources of energy it suddenly struck him why not conserve biodiversity of the forests by using the energy from pine needles to create electricity and power villages u00a0ldquoI had been exploring the use of pine needles for meeting energy needs such as cooking but the idea of electricity came when I saw a presentation on gasificationrdquo he recalls u00a0But the path to the pine trees was ridden with thorns The biggest obstacle Jain says was the mindset of people ldquoTechnology providers believed that pine needles could not be used in gasification Until of course we challenged thatrdquo Villagers clear the forest of dry pine needles Initially people dissuaded and even smirked at Jain Some experts claimed the density of the needles was too low for cones to be gasified to convert the carbonaceous materials into carbon monoxide hydrogen and carbon dioxide and create renewable energy It took Jain a couple of years to realise that the solution was really quite simple All it took to gasify the pine needles was to crush them and reduce their size before the final process of gasification Last year with funding from Swiss foundation Volkart and technical aid from DLab at MIT Massachusetts Institute of Technology he set up his first nine KW pine needle gasifier system at the Avani campus Not only does the pilot project generate electricity for 100 people in a small village but enough charcoal for them to use for cooking as well Charcoal briquettes which can be used for cooking are a byproduct of the process Power to the people Jain reveals that thanks to the pilot project the forest around Tripuradevi where the Avani campus is located has already seen a change in terms of regeneration of native species Currently Jain and his team are working to set up a gasifier in Chachret village of Pithoragarh district which will provide power for 1200 families across a cluster of villages in the Kumaon It should be operational by March this year ldquoThe real impact of this project will happen in four to five years but changes will be visible within in one yearrdquo His long term goal is to set up 20 such power stations in the next five years generating a total power of 25 MW he reveals u00a0The plan is to set up smallscale power plants that will generate electricity and charcoal in many villages This will generate employment among the rural youth who will be responsible for operating and maintaining these plants Over 200 people will be trained for setting up these power plants in a phased manner ldquoWe will also employ the local population for the collection of pine needles before they catch firerdquo Jain says the missionary zeal evident in his voiceu00a0 The sale of electricity to the local power utility will bring necessary revenue enabling people to earn cash for their other needs apart from buying charcoal for cooking Use of the byproduct to make cooking charcoal will save the local women from the drudgery of collecting fuel ldquoSavings on carbon emissions will also allow us to sell credits to organisations looking for projects to offset their carbon footprintsrdquo he adds For this longterm goal to be a success the organisation needs funding from the government ldquoThe Ministry of New and Renewable Energy has a standard scheme of funding such power projects They have given us a letter of comfort but the funding comes only after the project is commissionedrdquo u00a0he explainsu00a0 Solution in sight According to Jain the gasification of pine needles to create electricity is adaptable across the world ldquoLarge tracts of similar forests exist in many countries Roughly 165 million hectares are accessible for power generation where this technology could foster development and generate 100000 MW of clean power while enhancing ecosystem servicesrdquo he says Using the pine needles of trees spread over 35 lakh hectares in Uttarakhand to generate power for several dozen villages is no mean task But Jain says he is not propagating this over the use of hydro or solar power ldquoNo one option is better than the other At best they are complementing each otherrdquo he states ldquoHydro power has a limited potential so does solar and pine power Pine needles are available only during summer and need to be collected for round the year use The whole idea of using pine needles is to conserve biodiversity by removing the major cause of forest firesrdquo For now what Jain needs more than anything else is support from both the government as well as from private agencies that are also working to save our bio diversity preserve our forests and of course those looking to fund projects that lead to alternate sources of energy With a little help this could well be the next big thing the world will talk about Who knows Pine to power How itrsquos done The pine needles are crushed and reduced to 1020 mm when they are ready for use in the gasifiers Part of the biomass is combusted in the gasifiers at regulated oxygen supply to increase the temperature of the rest to about 800ordmC at which the biomass volatises and produces gas mdash a mixture of CO H2 CH3 which are all combustible gases These gases are then cleaned for use in internal combustion engines to generate poweru00a0The clean energy generated through the gasifier can be used in off and on grid situations providing electricity to the villagers Every 12 kg of pine needles can generate 1kW of electricityu00a0In the process 10 per cent pine needles come out as residue which is highquality powdery biochar Jainrsquos firm has also developed the process of using a locally available root tuber as a binder for briquetting this charcoal into highquality fuel briquettes for cooking One meal for a family of five people can be cooked using 700 gms of these fuel briquettesu00a0