NPI has joined with Moscow State University, in Russia, to undertake development of fuel briquettes made from waste materials such as sawdust or plant residues. The primary objective is to develop a value-added product ---while providing an alternative fuel that will help to deter deforestation and desertification in fuel deficient areas. Work will include research on a unique thermophilic bacterium that converts cellulose into sugar, so this inexpensive form of sugar may then be made into ethanol. Waste “fats” and additional sawdust or plant residues are then added to help form ethanol-based fuel briquettes. The briquettes and other solid fuel options are also being developed to assist the 2 (two) billion people still forced to cook and heat with firewood and dung. Our primary contact is Dr. Vladimir Yakowenko at Moscow State University Environmental Engineering.
St. Petersburg State Technological University
St. Petersburg, Russia, Self-Sufficiency Village (SSV) Project
(St. Petersburg District Government Registration No. 11/17 of 03.03.03)
Needful Provision,
Inc. (NPI) is joining with the St. Petersburg
District Agriculture Committee and St. Petersburg State Technological
University of Plant Polymers (TUPP) in the development of a US $140
million Self-Sufficiency Village (SSV) Project in the St. Petersburg
area of Russia. The SSV Project has the following features: Organic
food production to achieve community food security and biosecurity.
Homeland security and emergency preparedness features to assist populations
in survival and recovery from natural and/or terrorist-caused disasters.
Entrepreneurial training, Grameen-type banking, and microenterprise
development to provide jobs and income.
Development of alternative (renewable) energy systems to include biodiesel
production. Waste-to-energy (gasification) to convert waste to “green-electricity.”
“Zero net-energy” housing to provide safe, affordable
homes that provide their own energy. Resource conservation, with several
environmental benefits to include safe forms of energy (energy friendly
to the environment), no use of polluting chemicals for food production
---and the recovery/ recycling of all surplus nutrients (thereby avoiding
the typical excess nutrient pollution).
NPI will license
essential technologies, to the new SSV Corporation, and provide the
technical support needed to help assure success. The social advantages
of this project relate to jobs, income, food security, safe homes,
resource conservation, environmental protection, freedom-from-fear,
and better stability for the Russian economy. In Russia, the population
is far more aware of what is needed to achieve homeland security ---and
they are willing to work to achieve related objectives. Since Americans
do not really have this same understanding or high motivation, NPI
anticipates that our Russian counterparts will help us to better understand
the basic essentials of homeland security.
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N.B. Detailed planning documents, for the SSV Project, will be available
in late 2003 or early 2004. NPI plans to use the SSV model in several
other countries.