An ambitious public-private biogas project needs to be scaled up if it is to contribute to Botswana’s renewable energy targets by 2030. Sharon Tshipa investigates Trained mason Atamelang Matale (centre) and two colleagues mixing concrete needed to build a ‘mammoth’ biogas digester. Photo © Sharon Tshipa “We are building a mammoth!” says Atamelang Matale, her eyes in a happy dance. “This is the biggest biogas digester I am constructing to date.” Her voice is loud. It rises above the din of splashing water, the grating and clanking of shovels scooping and throwing concrete mix into a water-filled wheelbarrow. The end result is a grey porridge subsequently dumped into a digester pit pre-laid with welded wire mesh. The 29-year-old Matale is a biogas digester mason trained through a project in Botswana funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The project, launched on January 20 2017 and wrapped up in January 2022, sought to promote the production and use of biogas as an environmentally friendly source of energy for farms, households and institutions that produce or have access to agro-waste. Inside the 30m3 digester that Atamelang Matale and her colleagues are constructing in Betesankwe Village. Photo © Sharon Tshipa Matale has constructed 19 digesters that process agro-waste, such as cow dung and chicken litter, to produce biogas – directly used for cooking, heating and lighting – across south-eastern Botswana. The 30m digester she is currently constructing in Betesankwe Village in partnership with three colleagues is her 20th. “The digesters I built before only ranged between six, 10 and 20 cubic metres in size. This is huge, so we will be camping out here for the three weeks it will take to complete it,” she says. Being a mason has made her financially independent, she says, despite the gender discrimination that prevails in the male-dominated construction industry. Since 2018, 70 biogas digester masons have been trained by the project in six vocational training centres. Only 29% of them are women, even though the project originally aimed to achieve gender equity. The UNDP’s final project report admits that “while gender was a consideration in project design, the project itself has not made sufficient progress to determine any substantial gender impacts”. “People tend to look down on us, forcing us to work twice as hard to prove that we are capable,” says Matale. Tracey Rukero, a young female biogas digester mason who completed her training last year and has since constructed four digesters, shares similar sentiments: “Many people don’t think we can do the job,” she says. The two women have mixed views on whether the funded biogas project will contribute meaningfully towards Botswana’s energy transition ambition to have 15% of the Southern African country’s electricity supply come from renewable energy by 2030 – as opposed to the current 2.4% estimated contribution. Speaking at a high-level event on climate change in Kigali, Rwanda, in June this year, President Mokgweetsi Masisi reaffirmed Botswana’s commitment to a gradual transition from over-reliance on coal for electricity generation. He drew attention towards the need to increase the country’s share of renewable energy, and significantly improve the efficiency of the energy system. The government regards the development of a sustainable and commercial biogas sector as a key mechanism for achieving the reduction of harmful greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and effectively managing agricultural waste, especially from the beef and cattle industry. In its first nationally determined contribution to cut emissions and adapt to climate impacts, Botswana pledged to reduce its emissions by 15% by 2030, taking 2010 as the base year. The base-year emission estimation was 8,307Gg of COequivalent. Botswana’s GHG emissions make up 5% of Africa’s total 3.8% global emissions, according to the country’s Climate Change Policy. For this commitment to be realised and for biogas to make a plausible contribution to the reduction of GHG, Rukero and Matale’s experiences point to the urgent need for mindset change among citizens. “The project is not making much of an impact because some of the beneficiaries are failing to feed and take care of their biogas digesters,” explains Rukero, who adds that some of the beneficiaries feel that the renewable energy alternative has a bad smell, and producing it means handling dirt. Matale, on the other hand, suggests that the biogas project is a success already and can go far as it has brought financial relief to Batswana because they are using renewable energy resources to generate energy that is clean and free.