Help Transform 2000 Lives: Wasteland To Homeland

Dear Friends, Donors, Advisors, Members, Interns and Consultants,

On behalf of em[POWER] Energy Group family, I would like to sincerely thank each and every one of you for your continued support. Every donation whether it is through volunteer services or monetary helps ensures that we can continue helping our community locally and internationally.

I know there are a lot of other ways you could have spent this time and money, but you believe in our cause, so you chose to invest it in our project. Because of this investment, I want you to feel like part of our team. We're in this together. I want our success to be your success.

Our projects are across the globe and until one project site is fully operational, we will be sending you regular reports about our work and asking for donations in both voluntary service and monetary form. You'll know what your donation has helped fund, what accomplishments we have achieved and what our current needs are.

In 2012, we have transformed our overall model for the organization. Domestic model went from cross-functional team to cross-functional NGOs under em[POWER] umbrella for each of our project sites. Project sites transformed from in-country em[POWER] organization to partnership-dependant implementation model. Our goal is merge CSR and donations for energy development through on-site partner in order to fund non-energy segments of different countries project sites. We are continually adding subsidiaries in the US while development in both energy and non-energy segments.

Summary of the work through support from Gram Bangla Unnayan Committee:

We have successfully ran the following:

-  Researcher orientation sessions within the Landfill

- Training on health safety and hazards as well occupation safety hazard training

- Participatory dialogues with the 250 waste pickers of the landfill and 50 owners and 100 waste pickers of the waste collection vans

- Presented laptop to work and talk to students of the school

- Provided Gram Bangla with support for the school for 6 months provided by em[POWER] Rutgers Chapter

- Tube well system to give access to water to the community that does not have it

- Health Management team helped have a space for a doctor with patient area  and medical equipments for one doctor 

I hope you find this partnership valuable and worthwhile. I know the economy is tough, so thank you for investing your time and hard-earned money on our cause. Please consider telling your friends and family about our project - share the link on your blogs or social networks or just bring us up in conversation. You know your friends and family best so use your own words - tell them why you chose our project and what it means to you.

As we expand, we seek and need more help! We need more specialists, advisors, members, organizations, donors to continue to expand and implement in our project sites.

Thank you again for all you have done to help this cause.

With gratitude,

Nasir Uddin

VP, em[POWER] Energy Group

Links:

• Em[POWER] Facebook Page

• Em[POWER] Project Bangladesh 2012 Review (PDF)
  

Phase III Pilot Program Proposal and Business Plan in Action

em[POWER]’s Project Bangladesh has steadily evolved since its registration as a nonprofit organization in April 2011. Project Bangladesh aims to utilize waste as a renewable resource to improve the livelihood of waste pickers in the Matuail Landfill of Dhaka. After creating and testing prototypes, Project Bangladesh entered into the Phase III implementation of the em[POWER]model in February of 2012.

em[POWER]’s Phase III pilot program will include developing and executing a household waste management system to prevent waste pickers from continuing to endanger themselves by burning off the organic waste. The burning off of the organic waste allowed them to sort out the inorganic materials which were sold for profit. Instead, pre-sorting the waste will improve the health of waste pickers while still allowing them to collect the inorganic materials.During Phase III, a sanitary sorting facility will be constructed outside the premise of the landfill.This facility will be used to properly and safely sort the waste, which will then be transported to the composting station and then transferred for anaerobic digestion. Composting stations will support local agricultural efforts while the digestion system will generate biogas which can be used to generate electricity for local facilities. Meanwhile vocational training will take place at a community center that will be constructed next to the sorting facility. This community center will host a number of facilities including onsite eco-toilets and potable water supplies.

The phrase ‘one man’s trash is another man’s treasure’ implies, what we call ‘waste’ actually tends to hold great value when utilized properly. The first step towards collecting this lost wealth in Matuail is to work with local NGO’s as we teach the community how to separate out the organic waste and turn it into compost that can be sold or used for local agriculture. The process will be continuously scaled-up until we can install a small-scale bio-digester to produce methane fuel, thus powering a generator and electrical infrastructure for the community. Waste Stream AnalysisUltimately, we are driven by community development. We are conducting surveys to help us accurately and comprehensively identify Matuail’s greatest needs and priorities.The generated electricity will allow the school to expand its capacity to include more students, provide vocational training to adults, and power computers. In the meantime, we are running fundraisers to raise much-needed supplies for its students. Electricity can also be used by local health clinics to improve their services and preserve temperature sensitive medications or by community members to develop micro-enterprise s that will give them the tools, opportunities, and confidence that they need to participate and succeed in society.

• em[POWER] Annual Report 2011-12 (PDF)