P2269@com.qz.se ("ENG-LEONG FOO ", MIRCEN-STOCKHOLM) (05/17/89)
The Renewable Energy Research Centre was set up in 1981 to promote and co-ordinate activities at the University of Dhaka in the field of renewable energy (solar, wind, bioenergy, etc.). Projects related to bioenergy are: (1) Biomass Energy: Survey, Assessment and Growth (Contact: A.K.N. Nazrul Islam) (2) Photobiological production of hydrogen (Contact: S.Z. Haider & A.J. Mahmood) (3) Studies on micropropagation of fuelwood plants (Contact: A.S. Islam) (4) Bioenergy from Agriculture (Contact: M.R. Khan). In the area of microbial energy production - (a) encouraging results have been obtained in a study on photobiological production of hydrogen from water using solar radiation with green leaves of water hyacinth as the photosynthetic membrane. (b) work concentrates on the use of water hyacinth for biogas production as well as the use of mixed substrates ( rice straw, water hyacinth, cow dung). (c) new strains of anaerobic bacteria (identified as Zymomonas) have been locally isolated and used for ethanol production For more information on RERC activities, please contact - Prof. Muhtasham Hussain Director Renewable Energy Research Centre Faculty of Science University of Dhaka Dhaka, Bangladesh.