MONG Riththy Group (a privately held local agro-industrial company) is preparing to put “cleaner” charcoal on the domestic market after a US$10 million investment, its president told the Phnom Penh Post Tuesday. In the coming two weeks, the company is set to introduce between 250 and 1,000 tonnes of Acacia charcoal on the domestic market each month at a price of 1,200 riels (US$0.30) per kilogram, said Mong Riththy. The special charcoal is thought to be cleaner than the domestic charcoal used normally, as it burns at a high heat and does not produce as much smoke as other varieties. More…Biomass Briquette Plant Opens in Cambodia
By SIMON MARKS
Cambodia opened its first biomass “charbriquette” factory in Phnom Penh last month, an enterprise that will produce fuel for stoves from waste biomass material.
The factory, a venture backed by Geres and For a Child’s Smile, two French organizations active in Cambodia’s development community, aims to reduce demand for wood and charcoal that 80 percent of Cambodians use every day to cook and boil water.
“Climate change and global warming are serious issues these days,” said Yohanes Iwan Baskoro, Cambodia country director for Geres. The factory, Mr. Baskoro said, “will save about 1,600 tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering the atmosphere” every year.
The number of households projected to use charcoal as an energy source here will rise to more than one million in 2015 from about 500,000 now, according to a 2008 study conducted jointly by Cambodia’s Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy, the United Nations Development Program and Geres. (Read more)
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