a tax return so much to you, it needs a real goal of architecture is to create habitat for humans about their struggles and dreams. responsibility are huge. they have so much to lose. and shattering the glass ceiling. women in architecture dismiss has to be really, really good. start september 30th on d, w. a . by now it's clear that forces yours are not to way forward. they're driving climate change, and they're also running out are, won't be replenished in our life time. that's wide world is purely in its hopes on

renewables like sun, wind and by mars, which is the subject of our show today. hello and walk on to verse the addition of echo africa. i am chris philips. and i and sandra tween of you. now what is by you mass, exactly. it ease, plant, invest material that can be used as a fuel to produce heat or electricity. but haven't we learned that a bonnie rude and other organic material producers could born to excite emissions? well, that depends on how it is done. so he is a look at of what we have coming up. we'll see how organic material can also be used to make fatty laser. how poor residues can help most the energy greet and how both organic and non organic matter pollute waterways.

some months ago, the somali government declared a state of emergency drought there has left more than 2000000 people facing severe water shortages and also hunger. the you and food and agriculture going is a should seize, the situation is extremely wiring. but on top of the drought, ongoing conflict is forcing people to flick their horns. many have ended up in internal displacement, comes in one come for example, clean technology is being used to show people are getting the food they need until now moose say celia barrow has had to overcome her fear to cook on her wood burning stove. the mother of 6 children was forced to flee from severe drought and lives in a camp for internally displaced persons in jo, har, central somalia, providing for her family in the camp has been fraught with serious danger, merely bidding them hide, add the meal also, but we fled from july yellow,

warm and livid. this id please count. kilkari. ly hadley. well normally we cut wood from the jungle to cook food or yeah. all over hot muddle soccer. we face a lot of problems when we're in the jungle w l. a. we face sexual harassment only at including regular or in the live it glad assa mara. the other women in the camp report the same. sexual assaults are irregular threat. but the fear of being attacked while gathering wood will now hopefully disappear, just like the smoke pollution from the charcoal stoves. in this communal kitchen, the women take turns cooking for their families with bio gas, they get it free of charge from a near bike bio gas plant. the women of the camp also provide the fuel for the bio gas production themselves by collecting fresh cow dung. the dung is poured into a trough and stirred before it goes into the by a digestive tabby. the gas produced in the tank is piped underground into the

communal kitchen where it provides a hotter and cleaner flame than charcoal. for the around $100.00 women here, the bio gas is liberating in many ways by gus. got bio mass as a great solution for us on a code that we use to worry about would when we had too little to cook with it because it was too dangerous for women to collect word in the jungle home and i in law. now when we come home late, if we can cook our food in the bio gas kitchen without worrying sooner and i had that had to let besides providing free clean energy for cooking. the bio gas plant also helps the farmers in the region. the used kalman year from the bio digestive tank can be dried, crushed into powder and packaged as fertilize it for local thomas one bag costs about 30 years. but it's worth it thanks to hire yields and better

quality produce. while you're to get it. hi, my firm used to produce 40 bags of corn with each weighing a 100 kilos units of but last season we used by our gas fertilizer and we harvested 80 bags of corn, them each weighing a 100 kilos with another gun. we expect more this season and not get my late even though the country often lacks the know how and financial resources for a large scale implementation. the potential of bio gas is enormous, says ottoman mohammed yamani, a renewable energy expert and environmental consultant is so maria, they are that to $6000000.00 livestock, i mean was, according to fall. that's roughly 2 boys. 2, i mean little, but elaborate sites. so animal manure is politically available in somalia. so basically they're due to use

a bio gas in somalia is very viable by a guess technology might still be in its infancy in somalia, but the 1st steps have been taken and for the women in the refugee camps, the transition to clean energy has already had a positive impact on their lives. so bio mass evolves with growing resources and youth and wisdom in energy. it certainly seems like the prospect alternative paul source. and it is currently responsible for 5 percent of energy globally. but is there don't fight how clean is it really? that's a very good question, sandra and one that doesn't really have a simple answer. we want to look now at some of the pros and cons of using bio mass to create energy on a large scale. asked with so many phase, it is neither a miracle kill though a quick fix. and if managed poorly,

it can lead to more harm than goods. alpha non appeals, not shells, and other left over foods can actually power the device you're watching this on. it's called biomass energy. not just left overs would plants all animal theses can also be a source of electricity or heat. we are surrounded by biomass and as such by opportunities, trash from the dump as well as waste from homes. restaurants all forms all provide suitable organic matter. the collected waste is cleaned at a processing plant, a temperatures of around $55.00 degrees celsius. the waste is sealed off from oxygen and eaten up by bacteria in a, by a reactor. this process called anaerobic digestion generates gas that contains high quantities of me. they. it's a powerful source. we're generating electricity and heat once it's fed into the gas

grill. oh, it can also be used to power natural gas vehicles. the left over bio mass can be used as composites for farming, for example, taking the whole process circular by a gas plants of this time exists all over the world. in europe, there are around 20000 there are 2200 bio gas plants in the u. s. and about the same in thailand, malaysia and indonesia combined. buyer gas plants produce only a quarter of the c o. 2 emissions that coal plants emit and bio mass energy has one mortgage advantage over solar and wind in that is on demand. so you don't care if the wind's blowing sunshiny, but there is a catch by a me sane can leak from these facilities. this gas is the ability to warm the

planet is much greater than that of seo, too. and bye, yes, the synergies are only sustainable as long as waste is used if crops are cultivated for the purpose, it's not viable. the same is true of biofuels produced from biomass like fire ethan . oh, by a diesel. the crops will them need to be grown and that takes away space for food crops, or even to plates, forests, and biodiversity. as is happening with palm oil, trees and indonesia, sugar cane in brazil and rapes seed in germany. would pellets are an alternative and increasingly popular biofuel. but research has say, there is strong evidence that natural forests and habitats in eastern europe and north america are being destroyed by the rising demand for would pellets through illegal logging. u. s. e. u and british policy makers have classified woody bio mass as renewable, and therefore, governments are subsidizing the production and burning of wood pellets. produces

are required to reforest areas. so the c o 2 that is released while burning pellets is re absolved. but a study found that depending on the type of forest it could take between 40 full and 100 full years until nearly planted trees can absorb the same amount of carbon sucked up by the ones that was cut down over a 100 year period. ends down, trees, pine anyway. climb any these egg cross. ah, are a good source of energy over a 100 years. over 25 years of errors, 40 years. frankly, they probably are. especially when forests play another crucial role. countries are spending money. they should be spending on true renewables like wind and solar, on this energy source. ah, that's not going to get us where we need to be asked to plan and fast growing plans

could be another up and because the carbon emitted could be absorbed again, much more quickly than in trees. can you make bio mass ah, sustainable and a have you make sure it has a positive carbon impact answers? yes. but then you have to get into the details of what kind of bio mass, what kind of leon? ultimately, most forms of biomass pretend to be better than they are burning would alone, for example, is not a solution because even if it's source and sustainably, it's still produces emissions. would waste can however, be digested by that tyria added by a gas facility and organic products like that. banana peel power in your phone can help manage ways the cycles to de biomass energy covers any small part of our world wide demand. it can work in combination with other renewables,

but it's not scalable to be our main energy source in the future. lots kill energy production requires large amount of basic materials. but what can we do with the small amount of organic wished would produce in aka chince on a weekly basis. thus to can find, propose, as you see in this week's doing your bit, ah, it's a shame to see good food go to waste and not just because it has nutritional value . but also because when food rots it releases climate damaging emissions like methane table scraps can be put to better use. this restaurant in northern garner has a 0 food waste policy. any leftovers are put into underground fermentation pem's

restaurant. i know martin yellow bora ads, local bacteria to the mix. when sealed, it produces an organic fertilizer relatively quickly with the usual compost takes about 6 months to a. yeah, well, this vet laser takes barely 3 months and it's really to fit laser soils. we can't even extract liquid fret laser from this solid for life. to make the liquid version, martin yellow bore abs waste water from the kitchen to the pit. one local farmer has been using it to spray his corn crop to crops of changed color. compared to what you god bless at leather you see then look, compare when i tried to sample and basically within 7 days a week i saw a change in the plan. i haven't seen the evidence. i'm in chorus, and in tucson, quentina mountain yellow bore, i think spake, he says 10000 tons of solid organic fertilizer could be produced annually. and

northern gone to relearn from household and restaurant leftovers that would otherwise go to waste. and how about you? if you are also doing your bit, tell us about it, visit our website, or send us a tweet. patch tag doing your bit. we share your stories. so far we've presented examples of all gather much i can refer to good use. but sometimes the wrong kind of voice can end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. on next report deals with a devastating effect. so it can have on what the at once pristine em 5 megs. much to the dismay of people living in the area debbie leach is not impressed. few could guess where she is pulling up here. the river thames and

london has a few undesirable spots along its banks. and this here is wet life. it's caught on this twig. it's about one half me to thick mound of wet wipes, mixed with twigs and some salt few leaves. but it's basically solid, used wet wipes. locals have dropped the area which white island it country will house is this south like in people's bathrooms? it's people are using wet wipes in the bathrooms and then the thing. yeah. cough are flush that down the low. there's no bite of esoteric, they're tall, all the small animals you'd expect to see on river banks, and unfortunately, he is gone. debbie is part of a group of britons monitoring the condition of the rivers. something the authorities here rarely do these days. many are outraged that toilet we could end up here on the riverbank retired police officer.

ashley smith heads up a group that conducts daily detective work the washer company for the thames region . once a purification plant, not far from here. we see quite a nasty coating of grey fine sediment on the bottom and brown and grey owl gay, which is coating the gravel choking any we've life out of it. ashley smith is on his way to a spot where the company releases the purified waste water into the stream. but directly next to it actually points to a 2nd pipe. this one sometimes spews out untreated waste water, the actual chemicals, your hormones, the drugs, the bacteria, the human waste, the are heavy levels of phosphate and nitrogen. and an ammonia that all comes out here and that makes its way down into the river windrush then into the river thames sewage last clued from it 2 days ago. he says,

he's collecting film evidence. i'm going to put them gloves on because i'm going to post the camera after it's been in that the companies are allowed to release untreated waste water into the rivers, but only in exceptional circumstances. when there's flooding or the sewers are full after heavy rain. otherwise, it's illegal. our analyst can tell if it's happened by looking at war to industry, data flow data taken on 15 minute intervals. he can establish whether it's happened to early, if they've discharged it before treating sufficient for their permit. and we found a lot of illegal activity in that way. the washer company insists its activities are legal. the environment agency relies on companies to self monitor at the public outcry has now prompted an investigation. u. k. rivers are among the most polluted in europe. the government and water companies are accused of feeling to modernize the sewage system over decades. this is basically

a consequence of victorian infrastructure, and it's a, it's a huge undertaking to remove all of these storm overflows. they are therefore, emergency flash flooding events outside. they've always been part of the system, but we're taking action right now to, to eliminate some of these and reduce their harm. but it's predicted to take 10 or 20 years. so ashley wants to keep up the pressure by exposing as many illegal activities as possible. he recently found an undocumented pipe from thames water is about 3 meters down into the thames. here the water is in a shocking state containing feces, old food and grease. every time we've come, it's been worse than the last is. it's dreadful, it's, it's really bad. the water company claims not to have released any untreated sewage here since march last year. so it's a mystery how this condo came out of the pipe,

were presented to the environment agency, and i expect them to do very little life become almost redundant and a spectator in the engagement now between campaigners, the water industry and counselors and local people who are now really pushing for the changes. 2 of those local people arrive on the scene. oh you oh, they were hoping to go swimming. looking a bit crowded. unusual. that is not looking good. is it? no, at least the water company, no issues warnings, when it's releasing sewage into the tabs. it's disgusting and we shouldn't have to put up with this as the river here was so clean. you could see the river bed only a couple of decades ago. especially when they are group has come up with another strategy to get this stretch of the river cleaned up. the aim is that we're going to try and get designated bathing will to statist, which will mean that the environment agency are obliged to monitor regularly and

try and impose either some functions on times water the device their plan along with trevor williams. he takes regular samples and sends the results to the authorities. so you can see it's quite dirty today because it's just rained but hopefully not for much longer because their strategy worked. this stretch of the river has no been granted bathing water status. so things ought to get a lot cleaner here, soup, that'll be the 2nd river in the whole of the u. k. to have a bathing or to status so and hopefully other rivers will follow suit. and other water companies will take note that they can't get away with dumping that their waste in the river and placing polluting on barnett. the campaigners are having to go to great lengths and even resort to tricks. but thee, along with many britons just want the u. k. 's rivers to be cleaner again. oh,

they're small and made of plastic sashes. these little packets might be handy, but they quickly land in the garbage bin. and they don't ross in all web special, we chant the journey of such a sachet from the origins of the raw materials it's made from to its ends on the rubbish heap. we find out why the number of sa chaise is growing and why they're so lucrative for businesses, and so disastrous for our planet. find out more at d, w dot com slash plastic. the health of all our water sources is becoming more important than ever, especially as rise in temperatures and a drop in rainfall. a causing more and more water bodies to dry up. and as just the one issue that is pushing more counties to find ways to become more self reliant, that is true, chris, an example of that can be seen on

a reunion. the island nation in the indian ocean has set itself the goal of switching entirely to renewables before the end of the beget by taking advantage of all the resources at its disposal. reunion island is famed for its beautiful beaches and large green mountains. but it comes to carbon emissions. the islands record is less attractive. around 2 thirds of its energy needs are covered by fossil fuel. this heavy oil factory in the city of flu pool is run by french utility e d f. in future it's you to switch to lashley. couple neutral operation running on calls are in soil just one step towards achieving an ambitious goal. switching to renewables, completely by 2020 it. this power plant owned by albumin runs partly on coal from south africa in partly on domestic bio mass. it will need to switch completely to

bio mass in future. the sugar refinery next door it his provides a convenient source of the quinn fuel. this at gun will utilize as much of the sugar cane as possible. we pressed the liquid out of it in descent and f court in the kent gets distributed on the surrounding fuels as fit laser. the more losses go to the ram distilleries the albumen pastiche. and uses the plant favors to produce image that flows into the public grid from which we then draw our electricity is oh, by that him on the bottom of the albumen power plant accounts for around 11 percent of the islands overall in output. the conversion to all bye, almost production is costing the company to 100000000 euros. and that's just for this one plant. and i see no, don't worry. well it doesn't. did that is i want to new storage toms, they have

a capacity of 9500 cubic meters each. you have, these are the kinds of units remain you use. like we plant you sustainable by almost that miss european union standard. moment when you shall use would pellets from the united states, but to later switch to suppliers closer to like in mozambique in south africa. oh, prepare for farm porter. i known issue oil as it was on meter. i think you should only 10 percent of the would pallets will be source from the island. that means 900000 tons a you will need to be imported. the company says it will still cut the plants overall carbon footprint by over 80 percent. the government is more trusted in large scale solar farms like lesser doors in 9 megawatt project in the south of the island here. fruit and vegetables are grown under the solar panels which provide the plans protection from the hot sun. and some serena, this is a small island,

we have to make good use of space when you're building for farmland in power plant, sol. so here we are combining a solar power plant with that organic from we also have a battery system that towards the electricity produced during the day to feed it into the greed it peak time. so distorted in elgin bonner lawfully more the company plans to expand is more dull in multiply it's solar output 6 volt. that would be another important tip towards achieving unions goal of covering all its energy needs with cupboard neutral renewables by 2028. i am scared of we've run out of time for to day, but we are good for that. he could join us for this special edition of equal africa and a do be sure to tune in again next week, sometime someplace until then. i am sandra, twin over the signing of from compiler, here in uganda. looking forward to seeing you again next week,

sandra to all you viewers. albert, do be sure to share your thoughts and comments with us on our social media platforms. for now is good buy from me, chris, a lamps in oakland state. nigeria. ah, a a with

a many pushed out in the world right now. climate change, if any, off the story. this is my flex, the way form just one week. how much was going to really get

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ah ah, this is dw is coming to live from berlin condemnation, as russia declares victory and it's so called referenda. moscow installed officials claim up to 99 percent of voters and occupied ukrainian regions. want to join russia and formerly asked the kremlin for annexation.