The latest Business updates from the science industry
by Heather Hobbs
Cocoa Husks Fuel Secondary Industry Prospects in West Africa
“Ghana is the second highest producer of cocoa in the world and every ton of cocoa beans harvested generates 10 tons of cocoa pod husks. In the past, this waste material was underutilised,” said principal investigator, Jo Darkwa, Professor of Energy Storage Technologies in the Faculty of Engineering.
“However, feasibility studies indicate that cocoa pod husks could be converted into valuable bio-fuels; an important energy supply for rural areas that have only 15% electricity coverage at present. If successful, this new bio-energy infrastructure would support the Ghanaian government’s aim for universal access to electricity by 2030.” The Implementation of Bio-Rural Energy Scheme (IBRES) project, backed by the UK Government’s Global Challenges Research Fund, aims to makes practical and economic use of the discarded cocoa pod husks.
Professor Jo Darkwa, Faculty of Engineering, University of Nottingham
A project to generate electricity from discarded cocoa pod husks is set to benefi t West African farming communities currently with little or no access to grid power. Led by the University of Nottingham, development of the green technology would also improve socio- economic stability for cocoa producers in rural Ghana.
In addition to energy production and distribution, local jobs would emerge for the collection and transportation, treatment, storage and processing of this potentially lucrative byproduct. A community energy cooperative model will also help the farmers to make money from their new bio-energy source and hence reduce poverty. The main tasks of the project are to:
1. Characterise the four different types cocoa pods commonly farmed in six regions of Ghana for their use as bio-fuels.
2. Design, build and evaluate a small-scale bio-power electricity generation unit that burns cocoa pod husks - a waste product in production – in a gasifi cation system, which includes a gasifi er, a 5 kWe diesel generator set, a solar drier and pelletiser.
3. Develop guidelines for setting up full-scale bio-energy schemes and their integration into rural communities.
4. Investigate stakeholders’ perceptions of the bio-energy scheme.
5. Develop community co-operatives and governance structures for cocoa-producing regions.
In addition to Professor Darkwa, the Nottingham-led project team involves Dr John Calautit, Dr Mark Worall, Dr Yuehong Su and Nii Nelson of the Buildings, Energy and Environment (BEE) Research Group; Dr Alison Mohr from the Institute of Science and Society; Dr Karen Robertson from the Advanced Materials Research Group and the School of Chemistry’s Professor Robert Mokaya.
Nottingham academics are also collaborating with the Centre for Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development (CEESD) Ghana, Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Ghana where the bio-power unit will be installed and monitored by researchers.
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Innovation Challenge Winners find Support from Cluster
investment plan, operated by ADEME (the French Environment and Energy Management Agency), Bpifrance and FranceAgriMer.
“We are always happy to help our members in becoming successful. Our ambitious strategy is to be a key driver in the innovative healthcare technologies ecosystem,” said Stéphane Roques, General Manager of the Medicen Paris Region competitiveness cluster. “We will reinforce and strengthen our support and assistance to healthcare start-ups in order to further accelerate the transformation of our scientifi c and medical resources into economic value for the French healthcare sector.”
Stéphane Roques
Health competitiveness cluster Medicen Paris Region has supported four of the eight winners in the healthcare category of the second wave of the French government’s Innovation Challenge program. The four SMEs will receive in total more than €2 million ($2.3 million) from Bpifrance, the French government’s investment bank, to fi nance their research and development projects. Overall 65 awardees were selected in this round of the publicly-funded Innovation Challenge, which forms part of the French government’s
Of the four SME’s assessed by the cluster, Metafora Biosystems, will receive €1 million ($1.13 million) towards its CellMETA-analyser R&D project for a completely automated platform that can detect any type of cancer cell, also offering great potential for large-scale manufacturing. Metafora initially plans to develop the platform for early detection of liver and pancreatic cancers, followed by others such as colon cancer.
“We are delighted to be one of the eight health sector winners of the Innovation Challenge and would like to express our heartfelt thanks to both the General Secretariat for Investment and Bpifrance for the trust they have placed in us. We are also grateful to the Medicen Paris Region competitiveness cluster for its support and expertise during this project,” said Vincent Petit, CEO of Metafora.
The winning cluster SME’s also included:
Incepto Medical, with its €350,000 ($396 K) Augmented Radiology project to help physicians identify, access and use the best-in-class imaging AI (artifi cial intelligence) solutions and using these to create new applications.
CardioRenal - with a funding of €355,000 ($402 K), aims to develop a more advanced version of its telemedicine solution, HomeHeart™, which enables the daily measurement of three cardiac biomarkers via a drop of capillary blood taken by the patient at home. Rheonova – MucoCE project.
Rheonova designs rheometers to be used for the measurement of biological fl uids, particularly in chronic respiratory diseases. The MucoCF project, funded to the amount of €352,000 ($398 K), intends to establish a predictive tool for acute episodes for use by cystic fi brosis patients.
MagIA Diagnostics, a member of the Lyonbiopole competitiveness cluster which joined Medicen Paris Region in January 2019, was also a winner of the Innovation Contest for its MagIA Dia IST project which has received a €296,000 ($335 K) grant to develop a portable biological analysis device based on an innovative immunomagnetic technology.
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