Kenya launch by Swedish CDM company Tricorona

Millions of Kenyan households need to boil their drinking water. When this is done using firewood, it causes deforestation. Households spend hours a day collecting firewood, or a large part of their income to buy it. Tricorona now presents a solution: The Solvatten water purification device, to be made accessible to thousands of households in the Western Province.

- We are very proud to bring Solvatten to rural households in the Western Province, which at the same time gives households safe water and avoids deforestation. Thanks to carbon credits, we can make Solvatten accessible even to households with low incomes, says Niels von Zweigbergk, CEO of Swedish-based Tricorona, at the launch for the Tricorona Solvatten CDM-project, held the 11^th of October in Kakamega.

The Solvatten, which means “sunwater” in Swedish, purifies the water using the UV- rays and the heat from the sun, which destroys E-coli, cholera, salmonella and other bacteria. The Solvatten looks like a jerry can, but once the user has collected water in it, it is opened at the middle and put in the sun. The transparent plastics and the shape of the container cleans the water in a few hours. How long it takes depend on how strong the sunlight is. A simple symbol in the shape of a happy green face tells when the water is ready - is the face still angry and red, the Solvatten has to stay in the sun.

- More than two thirds of all health problems stem from unhealthy water, used for drinking, cooking or washing. That is why it is so important to ensure that Kenyans have access to safe water, which doesn't come at a high cost in terms of money, time or the felling of trees. Once the household has  gotten the Solvatten, safe water is for free, says Solvatten inventor and CEO Petra Wadström.

Tricorona aims to establish Solvatten as a CDM-project under the United Nations Kyoto Protocol. As a first step the project is currently starting up in the Western Province, where field trials have been undertaken to establish the exact carbon benefit with Solvatten, based on the amount of firewood that is saved when water is not purified through boiling. Tricorona currently has more than 125 registered CDM-projects in Africa, Latin America and Asia. Several European companies have already decided to off-set part of their climatic impact through Solvatten.

- CDM is Clean Development Mechanism; the reduced carbon footprint is only part of the story, This is very clear with Solvatten, where the reduced emissions go hand in hand with better living conditions for rural households, says Niels von Zweigbergk who also emphasizes that Tricorona is on the look-out for other CDM-projects in Kenya and East Africa.

Tricorona will use the carbon finance to reduce the price for the Solvatten device, and will team up with Micro-Financing Institutes to further lowering the threshold for households that want to get safe water without having to spend time and money on firewood. Groups of youth entrepreneurs in the Province are also involved, to help spread Solvatten and create local employment in the process.

Read more at www.tricorona.com and www.solvatten.se.

For further information, including photos and footage: Please contact Niels von Zweigbergk, CEO Tricorona AB, or Petra Wadström, CEO Solvatten AB through Mattias Goldmann, 0716-328 598, mattias.goldmann@tricorona.com