Keeling Curve

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Project Summary / Description:

KFPL started with incense-sticks and cones, wherein women who were manual scavengers handle approximately 2.3 tons of flowers, daily from 79 temples in Kanpur. Call it serendipity or luck, we observed a thick fibrous mat growing on unused pile of flowers. With deep-dive research we found that it was vegetative stage of mushroom- mycelia that holds/ binds the material together. 

We decided to use this binding property of mushrooms and make packaging material out of it. And the thought process was, if we are able to make it why not fight Earth‚ 5th biggest pollutant, the toxic non-biodegradable Styrofoam.

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Best Estimate of GHG Avoidance/Reduction of This Project (Tonnes CO2 Equivalent/Year):

Impact on Underrepresented Groups:

Florafoam is the genesis of a circular economy solution - Environmental pollution, Waste disposal and Socio-economic Sustainability. The supply of raw materials (temple-flowers and agricultural-stubble) and demand of eco-friendly packaging for consumer goods i.e., Florafoam is undying. 

Stubble burning in India causes 35B$ economic losses & significant health risks (IFPRI). The stubble remains after mechanized harvesting have no economic value, thus farmers retort to stubble burning. Despite bans and legal penalty, farmers in Punjab-Haryana continue to set their fields on fire, causing poisonous smog (which contains trace metals) and severe environmental depletion in Central India. We plan to process approximately 4.5 tons stubble and other organic waste on a monthly basis at our pilot facility for Florafoam and target at handling 225 tons per month by 2025. 

We flowercycle 69 tonnes of temple-flowers on a monthly basis and plan to reach the 1560 tonnes mark by 2025. Pesticide-laden flowers create havoc in the fragile ecosphere, leaching in the groundwater -causing irreversible damage. Toxic Arsenic, Lead & Cadmium from the harmful farm-runoff, pesticides, insecticides (>10 ppm) from flowers mixes with the river water making it highly poisonous (PH 6-8.5) -linked to contracting cholera, hepatitis & severe diarrhea ‚ the leading causes (86.7%) of child mortality across India & Bangladesh. 

a. >11,060 metric tonnes temple-waste flowercycled 
b. >110 metric tonnes chemical pesticide (>10ppm) offested 

Presently, ~80 women who used to be manual scavengers, work with us for flower collection, sorting, and processing and we target employing >4000 women manual scavengers by 2025. India‚ >1.6 Million manual scavengers jump neck deep into clogged sewers and scrape human faces from dry latrines and sewers. Since centuries, the Manual scavenger community is leading a wretched life of massive social discrimination and severe health hazards.

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