Punjab to Introduced Environment Friendly and Cost Effective Technology for Brick Kilns

Environment Department Punjab (EDP) will soon introduce an environment friendly and cost effective technology of brick kilns. It was stated by Mrs. Zakia Shahnawaz, Minister for Environment Punjab while addressing participants of a workshop being held in Chamber of Commerce & Industry, Lahore. She said that EPD is closely working with All Pakistan Brick Kilns Owners Association. She appreciated the efforts of Mr. Shoiab Khan Niazi and other members especially Haji Islam of All Pakistan Brick Kiln Association for establishment of new model ZigZag Technology Brick Kiln at Raiwind Road Lahore. She also thanked Federal Government, International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), Lahore Chamber of Commerce & Industry (LCCI) and Brick Kiln Association for arrangement of this training workshop. Zakia Shahnawaz said that all existing brick kilns will be converted to new zigzag technology in case of success of model brick kiln.
It was briefed in the training workshop that in several developing countries including Pakistan, clay fired bricks are produced using traditional technologies, some of these practices have severe impacts on health of living beings. Various studies have established that improved technologie and practices can reduce fuel consumption and pollutants emissions (including black carbon) significantly. EDP is working with All Pakistan Brick Kiln Owners Association and ICIMOD to explore the cost effective and environment friendly technologies. For this purpose, All Pakistan Brick Kiln Owners Association has visited Nepal earlyer this year to analyse the zig zag brick kilns site in Khatmandu (Nepal) with the collaboration of ICIMOD. The Association and ICIMOD are convinced that this zig zag technology is very close to brick kilns of Pakistan. Representative of ICIMOD was of the view that 70% emissions can be reduced through this technology and their fuel efficiency is 40% better than our conventional brick kilns.
The clay brick-manufacturing sector in Pakistan, with an estimated 1.5% contribution to the GDP, is still a highly un-regulated and un-documented area. There are about 10,000 conventional brick kilns in the Punjab. The typical processes for production of bricks consist of hand-made bricks which are baked in local made kilns. Mechanized brick making plants and different types of kilns like the tunnel kiln, Hoffman kiln, modified FCBTK and the VSBKs have also been introduced in different countries. Earlier attempts to introduce mechanized brick making and brick baking did not meet success owing to a mix of techno-operational and adaptability/ acceptability problems. Most of the brick kilns, producing clay bricks, are located in or around the urban cities of Pakistan. They emit thick black smoke containing several air pollutants (carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides) and fine particulate matter, which present serious health hazards (human illnesses, animal and plant life destruction) to communities living around them.
The Nepal visit helped the entrepreneurs to learn and understand the brick kilns built as per the design manual which was produced after the 2015 earthquake in Nepal. The design manual is one of the first kind in South Asia, as it incorporated the practical knowledge and engineering design of the kilns. The training will cover topics like, modifying of exiting BTK to zigzag Kiln, clay preparation, brick firing,  fuel and combustion, field level training etc. The main objectives of the training programme are to educate the brick makers and other participants about the shortcomings of existing technologies and practices and its impacts on their revenues as well as on climate, agriculture and health, to educate them about the cost-effective technology solutions for cleaner brick production, its benefits and best operating practices, enhanced capacity of entrepreneurs and workers on the cleaner brick firing practices, to provide a platform to the participants to discuss the issues and challenges and learn from the experiences from some of the early adopters and to train the fire masters to operate zigzag firing practices. The training workshop will held on 9th and 10th September 2017. The participants of the workshop will visit newly constructed Model ZigZag Brick Kiln on 11th September 2017.