by Fenna Snater

08 January 2009

Kathmandhu Valley, Nepal: Amongst many other things, I once worked on the start-up of a site sewage treatment plant. Not the fanciest of experiences, but definitely the one that proved most useful when standing in the mud looking at a biogas installation in Nepal some 12 months later…

I have always spent a large part of my time on community projects, on fundraising, on work with NGOs. Reaching out is a part of me. Yet, it was not until I went on a UNV-facilitated mission through the Shell corporate volunteering programme Project Better World that I came to understand the true meaning of the word 'volunteering' and the feeling of belonging it creates.

The concept of the biogas installations is simple; waste in, gas out. Boys’ schools, university dormitories and monasteries collect sewage, kitchen or garden waste and feed it to the biodigester, where anaerobic bacteria transform the waste into usable methane gas and bio-fertilizer. Every time again it is a truly amazing sight to view biogas users prepare a meal on gas generated from nothing but waste!

A chemist by background and currently based in Sakhalin, Russia, I am more usually involved in the commissioning and start-up of a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plant. Together with my colleagues I have brought online various utility and process systems. Before I came to Sakhalin I worked as a Sustainable Development Consultant, mainly on environmental and social impact assessments in Nigeria.

Based on my experience and skills, the Shell Project Better World-UNV team matched me with the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) Biogas Project in Nepal. The assignment entails an analysis of the optimum design and operating conditions for institutional biogas systems installed at various locations in Kathmandu Valley. Indeed it proved to be the perfect match!

I split my six-week assignment into two parts to gain the maximum value in the short time available. During the first visit in October 2008, I studied the biogas plants and set up a monitoring system. I visited 14 installations built to three different designs and all operated under slightly different conditions.

During my first field visit I worked with university intern Rajana Maharjan. Together we prepared a monitoring programme, which Rajana is currently implementing together with the users of the various biogas installations. When I return to Nepal in March 2009 we will analyse these data and, in joint effort with users and partner organizations, aim to formulate advice on how to achieve optimum design and operating conditions for biogas installations at institutional level within the Nepali context.

It has been such a pleasure to work with the combined Shell Project Better World, UNV and UN-HABITAT Team. The Shell Project Better World team did an excellent job in engineering volunteer assignments that are tailor-made for those of us who are full-time employed, always too busy, but yet motivated to make a concrete contribution towards a better world.

The UN-HABITAT team made it possible for me to spend my limited time effectively by involving me fully and providing the required support and resources for the work; hardly ever I have felt so warmly welcomed! And UNV brought the two together by ensuring smooth logistics, good mutual understanding and, above all, by creating an atmosphere of encouragement, of unity.

It felt amazing to be invited to join this group of volunteering individuals from all over the world in their united effort to reach out.

In the spirit of volunteering we continue to work with the UN-HABITAT Nepal team over email and telephone. We will aim to involve various Shell experts so to ensure maximum inter-organizational learning both ways.

To me the Shell Project Better World-UNV mission has been a unique opportunity to deploy my professional skills on a humanitarian project during my holiday time and to bring learning back to my professional job; surely a holiday well spent and an experience I can recommend to all.