The Environmental Institute (O Instituto Ambiental - OIA) was founded in 1993 to integrate and distribute technologies for purification of effluent water by recycling nutrients for agriculture, soil protection, and biogas energy production.

The advantage of these integrated technologies over conventional purification is their capacity to clean water using processes that produce revenues and employment instead of only costs. This is achieved by reusing effluent to generate biogas, rebuild the soil, protect against flooding, prevent disease, and eliminate odors. The systems are also scaleable, from small systems of a few square meters for individual families, to large ones for agro-industries.

OIA promotes technology transfer by empowering local people and involving all types of professionals – engineers, educators, construction workers and local leaders. This integration lets communities build and operate systems that work for years.

To meet the urgent demands for this new development paradigm, OIA established a presence in the southern, southeastern, north and northeastern regions of Brazil including the States of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, and in Nicaragua, Dominican Republic and Haiti in Central America and the Caribbean.

In the beginning our main activities were in poor communities, but with the spread of environmental consciousness, middle and upper classes are becoming interested in our technologies and more people want to replicate our integrated biosystem. In this sense, OIA methods have been a “trickle-up” approach, starting with the poor then educating wealthier participants.

Rural populations, which still constitute a large percentage of Latin America, produce high levels of organic residues and are becoming more interested in our work. Isolated cities such as Laranjal do Jari in the Acre Amazon Region are interested in more sustainable technologies. OIA was contracted to solve sanitation problems there.

Coffee producers in Central America and Caribbean are utilizing our system to obtain ISO 14001 Certification with cleaner production. Examples include State Coffee of Nicaragua and Benefico Ramirez of Dominican Republic. In the coffee producing mountain areas of Nicaragua, projects are also focused on treating human residues. Lack of water treatment is directly related to many diseases, especially in the rainy season. A big indirect benefit of our system is savings to residents and government agencies by avoiding having to buy expensive medicine.

Residual water from coffee production is also treated in the same systems, avoiding river pollution and fish kills from zooplankton and phytoplankton blooms. Bad odor is also eliminated, improving people’s daily lives. For example most schools are located close to rivers where odor has improved.

Many companies are now interested in replicating our system and are searching for our cooperation. One local company that started with our system is now expanding beyond sanitation into improving food production for local workers and using bio-digesters with livestock and recycling residues as nutrients.

A representative of the President of Nicaragua examined our system as a way of eliminating hunger and environmental problems. The government’s concept is to have one bio-digester for each rural family, benefiting 75,000 families in five years. To achieve such numbers OIA introduced pre-fabricated systems, but there is still a lack of finance for infrastrucure to deliver those.

The OIA Central American experience was presented at the 22nd Latin American Conference of Coffee Producers in Sao Salvador – El Salvador 2005. As a result in 2006 coffee producers from Dominican Republic contacted OIA for electricity production via biogas. Small Coffee Producer Associations also showed interest to use our technology in high mountain regions using human, animal and coffee production residues to produce biogas. Together with the University of Jarabacoa, our system is being replicated and distributed through Dominican Republic. OIA specialists are being invited to work on a two year project aiming to train local installers.

In Haiti, sanitation is a major health problem, and the problem is made worse by repeated flooding. Viva Rio NGO, which has projects in Haiti, invited our staff to train local workers to replicate our technology in that country. The first project is being installed in the very poor community of Belaire in Port Principe in February and March 2009.

In Brazil we find enormous distribution possibilities, especially for domestic bio-systems. Public and private companies are viewing our technology as a solution for poor areas, reducing pollution levels in local rivers. Latin America’s biggest sanitation company – SABESP – is an example. Also, Aguas do Imperador Company from Petropolis – State of Rio de Janeiro – is aiming to spread our system to a great number of communities. The local River Basin Committee is financing projects with our technology representing an investment of about $USD 1 million, always with local workers.

Other companies are also interested in our system. One example is a plant installed in Espirito Santo State with our technology financed by an export-import company interested in promoting sustainability. This project was chosen from among a thousand applicants, to receive finance from Petrobras (one of world’s biggest oil companies), including research with a local university – FAESA.

Brazil’s largest single facility investment – COMPERJ – a gigantic petroleum processing plant – also includes our system, and is monitored by Petrobras.

Other projects are also happening with Ouro Preto University in Minas Gerais State. Biogas technology is being studied in combination with filters, heaters, ovens, lighting, small and large motors. This involves a great amount of scientific and engineering investigations.

In the human sanitation field, our main problem is cultural. People still have problems to accept recycling of human waste, so food crops are usually not included in those types of projects. However, acceptance of this safe technology can be accelerated with investments in environmental education and information. People see this is safe and has many benefits Once they are educated.

In developing nations a high percentage of the population lives below the poverty line. For these people, many government subsidize gas, which mainly benefits private oil companies. However these countries have enormous possibilities to invest in biomass energy production that uses biodigestion instead of burning biomass.