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Luara Ceramic Fuel Switching / Forest Protection Project

Certified under the Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) and designed under the

Social Carbon Standard

Luara Fact Sheet

Luara Project Design document

Excerpts from the report titled “Social Carbon Methodology Sustainability Index for the Ceramic Industry Enterprise Profile –Zero Mark” 

 

This project prevents the release of CO2 into the atmosphere by protecting the important Brazilian Cerrado forest. This is done by switching the fuel used to run a ceramics factory from virgin wood to renewable bio-mass such as sugar cane bagasse, wood chips, coconut husk, bamboo and sawdust. It benefits the community in the area by using the Social Carbon methodology. This measures and improves social conditions according to several social metrics.

Luara Ceramic is a small and typical red ceramic plant located in the southeast of Brazil which produces primarily blocks and other structural ceramic devices. It produces 550,000 ceramic devices per month. To supply the heat necessary to cook its products, maintaining a temperature of 800ºC for 24 hours in both kilns, the fuel used was formally from native wood extracted from nearby Cerrado forest. This practice has led to the deforestation of this very crucial biome located in the southern region of Mato Grosso do Sul State of Brazil.

This project has prevented the use of native wood (about 600 cubic meters of it per month) as a fuel for the kilns that cook the ceramic pieces by completely substituting it with renewable biomasses while using the Social Carbon methodology to monitor and improve social, environmental, and economic conditions in the area.

Renewable biomasses, such as sawdust, sugar cane bagasse, wood chips, coconut husk and bamboo are all the wastes of other industries and will also now be put to effective use instead of being discarded to anaerobically decay in local landfills, where it would normally emit significant levels of greenhouse gas to the atmosphere.

The implementation of the project activity has also saved energy due to the following modifications:

• Use of biomass with less surface area than wood;
• Insertion of air with the new fuels, increasing the oxygenation;
• Reduction of thermal energy loss since the entrances will be kept closed or connected to the equipment.
• Injection of biomass controlled by equipment, avoiding wastage of fuel that often occurred when using wood.

 

Due to this fuel change, major technological improvements related to the purchase of new equipment were necessary, presenting previously insurmountable financial difficulties as well as challenges involving the training of employees in the use of burning the new fuel, a factor exacerbated by the fact that wood use has been a traditional and well-known process.

This fuel switching project is reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through the substitution of wood for renewable biomasses to generate thermal energy, which was concluded to be only feasible when considering the income derived from selling carbon offsets.

 

The region

 Cerrado is the regional name given to the Brazilian savannas. Around 85% of the great plateau which occupies Central Brazil was originally dominated by the Cerrado landscape, representing around 1.5 to 2 million km², or approximately 20% of the country’s surface. There is great habitat variability in the different types of Cerrado which supports an enormous diversity of plant and animals species. The urban pressure and the rapid establishment of agricultural activities in the region have been rapidly reducing the bio-diversity of this ecosystem.

 

 

 

The ceramic sector located in the north and northeast regions of Brazil is comprised mostly of small scale industries.  Although the industries have extensive experience in the production of structural devices, they still possess an emerging level of expertise in many technical areas, especially with regard to process efficiency, product quality and environmental awareness.  Additionally, a profile of the sector’s employees points to serious social and financial problems in the areas of education, professional training and access to basic financial services and savings potential.

In addressing and monitoring the viability of the Project given these realities of the broader ceramic sector, Social Carbon’s approach in cooperation with local stakeholders demonstrated that improving the potential for sustainable development would demand, first, internal actions that would emphasize the owner’s social and environmental responsibilities. Furthermore, Luara’s owner is called on to improve work conditions and his employees’ access to human and educational resources, as well as work steadily to reduce undue stresses on the environment caused by his enterprise’s activities.

In order to evaluate these and other criteria measuring a given project’s sustainability, the Social Carbon methodology concentrates on the social and environmental performance of the enterprise throughout the life of the project.

The Project’s contribution to sustainable development
This project activity seeks to minimize the deforestation of the Cerrado biome by discouraging the commercialization of the native firewood and mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but will further sustainable development of the host country, by:

• Improving the environmental integrity of the immediate area through a more prudent use of agricultural refuse as biomass for fuel, which in the baseline scenario would be left to decay anaerobically in open dumps;
• Increasing job opportunities in the local community where the ceramic industry is located due to the project activity;
• Diversifying and improving sources for thermal energy generation;
• Using clean and efficient technologies, which promotes the preservation of natural resources in accordance with Agenda 21 and with Brazilian Sustainable Developments Criteria;
• Acting as a pioneer in demonstrating the viability of implementing innovative technological practices to the ceramic sector as a whole, thus promoting holistic change in the more effective use of renewable biomass and the better realization of more efficient thermal energy generation potential;
• Contributing directly to the conservation of Cerrado biome through the use of renewable biomass.