PAPER BRIQUETTE ………..a way to recycle your waste paper into burning fuels.

A briquette is a compressed block of coal dust or other combustible biomass material such as charcoal, sawdust, woodchips, peat or paper, used for fuel. Briquettes are mostly used in places where cooking fuels are not easily available.

Paper briquettes are made from waste papers such as newspapers, shredded and compressed by a briquettor into cylindrical or cuboid form.

So, why should one go through the stress of converting their waste papers into briquettes to be used as fuels? Here are some reasons to adopt paper briquette as an alternative to firewood:

1. Cost: Paper briquettes are extremely cheap to make as they use basic resources such as newspapers
2. Availability: The main advantage of using paper briquettes is the wide availability of resources. With these raw materials already in hand, paper bricks can be used as free fuel for wood stoves and fireplaces.
3. Eco-Friendly: Since paper briquettes are constructed from waste material, they are environmentally friendly. Instead of disposing paper trash, one can use them to create fuel for burning. Furthermore, using paper bricks instead of traditional firewood reduces the pressure placed on forests and woodcutting. Paper briquettes lessen the demand for precious natural resources; deforestation is a major concern in preserving Earth’s valuable species and organisms.
4. Construction: Using the paper briquettes is easy and time-efficient construction process. To make a paper brick, simply soak the paper materials in water and compress it into the paper brick maker mould. Press the brick, using the handles from the brick maker, to squeeze out all the water. Dry out the paper brick to obtain the hardened brick product. The entire process is simple to follow and quick to complete.
5. Source of income: It can help the people in the community to earn money, lessen the rubbish in the community and turns it into a source of energy and also provide additional income to the farmers who can sell their agro waste to briquette manufacturing companies thus offering a very good substitute for wood fuel, charcoal coal and lignite.

Though briquettes have a high potential of substituting charcoal and wood fuel the following challenges may be experienced:

1. Paper briquettes would have undesirable combustion characteristics like smoking if they are not given enough time to dry,
2. There is a tendency of briquettes to loosen when exposed to water or high humidity weather conditions which is as a result of poor compaction.

How do they differ from traditional forms of fuel?

These briquettes are very different from charcoal because they do not have large concentrations of carbonaceous substances and added materials. Compared to fossil fuels, the briquettes produce low net total greenhouse gas emissions because the materials used are already a part of the carbon cycle. The briquettes burn slowly, therefore reducing the amount of fuel used.