First prize for team Hellouw in the Challenge: Healthy Planet

The Challenges are part of Creating Tomorrow, an initiative of ARCADIS and KNHM in collaboration with universities.

There will be three Challenge rounds, each round has three teams and one winner. The final three winners (of each Challenge) will compete with each other in November 2013 at the Concert-builing Amsterdam. Round two and three are still open for registration!

The first Challenge: Healthy planet was won by team Hellouw. The team members are: Igor Milosavljevic, Dorine Kea, Maja Valstar, Rene de Brouwer, Mathijs Haerden, Teun Schuwer. Some students are from the Wageningen University and one is of the Chair Group Landscape Architecture Wageningen.

From the official Creating Tomorrow Challenge website:

The assignment: How can the village of Hellouw become a sustainable energy entrepreneur?

Hellouw (in the province of Gelderland) is a special village. Why? Because the local residents want to realize the construction of a biodigester. Through this, the village wants to take a giant step towards independence from external energy supplies. But their ambitions go further: Hellouw wants to be energy-neutral and make money from the sale of energy, to invest in projects to increase the quality of life in the rural heartland. What is the ideal way to link the people in the area structurally to the digester? What technical and organisational steps are needed? And who will guarantee the major investments needed? Do we have a model that can change the entire social and energy landscape? Create an inspiring vision for the future!

The conclusions and solutions from Team Hellouw (Blue)

Cycle Hellouw – Renew your energy
Hellouw is a small village of 900 people located on the Waal River between Tiel and Dodrecht. For the past 5 years, two brothers, Kees and Henk van Noord, run the Hellouw Biomass Foundation to introduce a biodigester in Hellouw. We were asked to create a vision on the implementation of the Biodigester in the local environment and society. Together with parallel projects connected to the biodigester, we want to stimulate the economy, improve the environment, promote healthy livelihood, and foster social pride in the municipality. Our plan will elevate Hellouw to a sustainable pinnacle of rural development by 2030 to stand proudly as an example pathway to sustainable development for other rural communities.

To make the biodigester the start of an integrated quality development effort, we need to start cycling. Not only in the proverbial sense, but also literally! All developments will be adjoined to a cycling route that runs along the suppliers of biomass, the biodigester and the multiple users that benefit from the digester. The route is a way to create recreational space, educate children about sustainability, attract tourism, and showcase involved partners.

Financing the project will cost 6,300,000 Euros in its first step. 70% of the project will be financed by banks, 30% by other entities. We think that the comprehensive idea of the biodigester combined with the cycle route with its social, economical and cultural aspects has a lot to offer for farmers, villagers and companies. These stakeholders will invest in this project, which also makes further sustainable development possible, by making parts of the revenue flow back into the local community funds.

We have so much faith in this project, that if we win, we promise to invest a big part of the prize money in the biodigester!