The Danske Bank Group invests in carbon credits from a Gold Standard biogas project in India. The main objective of the project is to set up household plants that enable people to use biogas fuel. A household loads cow dung into a tank that coverts the dung to biogas that can be used for cooking and for heating hot water, among other things.
The biogas plants are an alternative to common household heating equipment such as inefficient wood-fired mud stoves. The project thus replaces non-renewable wood as a fuel with clean, efficient biogas, which comes from a renewable energy source.
It also helps to protect and conserve the local environment and biodiversity by reducing the uncontrolled deforestation in the project areas.
In addition, it improves women's and children's health by reducing kitchen smoke (more women in India die from respiratory diseases caused by kitchen fumes than from malaria).
Some 50,000 plants have already been set up and put into service, primarily in southern India, for instance Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
Last updated/revised on February 5, 2009