Thursday, May 20, 2010

poop power (Swazi cow!)



I wrote here some years back about the film Soylent Green and how the idea of recycling dead bodies for food and energy was ethically abhorrent but a viable business proposition. Then there was California's plan to recycle dog manure. Now comes HP's investigation into the possibilities of using cow manure to power computers (the article is here).

This is highly interesting news for us here in Swaziland, since one thing we do have an abundance of is cow culture; cows are food, cows are wealth, cows are lobola (dowry/bride-price payment). Cow dung is also, literally easy to find and scoop up (perhaps too easy: a politician got himself into a lot of trouble a few years back for scooping up some sacred cow dung--true story).

We've been investigating the use of sugarcane for energy/ethanol production; now we have another road to follow!

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HAROLD BUDD: go in peace

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