News - April 2003
Ecomaterials lecture at the College of Engineers
On March 7 Kurt Rhyner of Grupo Sofonias presented a lecture about ecomaterials at the Guatemalan College of Engineers. Around 150 people attended the event and afterwards many people from the College of Engineers, as well as the College of Architects and various student associations approached the Javier Quiñonez, research engineer and director of the Center for Engineering Investigation, to express their pleasure about the lecture of Dr. Rhyner and are interested in coming into contact with other people with similar ideas and to have similar presentations at their colleges and associations.
A brickmaking village and a university research institute
This village of brickmakers nestled in the Andes produces almost all the burnt-clay bricks used in central Ecuador, and most of the brickmakers are women. Now, through EcoSouth in Ecuador, the villagers are developing synergies with CIDEM that would unite theory and practice. Through this program whereby the experiences of the villagers in brick production would be incorporated into investigations that CIDEM is carrying out about improving the eco-efficiency of clay bricks by taking advantage of modern scientific developments. According Fernando Martirena of CIDEM who visited the village: “Among the main objectives is to maintain tradition and preserve the environment.”
Cleanest moulds ever seen!
On a visit to the workshop of Guillermo Chavarria in Baja Verapaz, according to Kurt Rhyner: “We found the cleanest moulds ever seen! 400 Tevi moulds looking as if they had just come out of the injector, clean and shiny, and all with impeccable wooden frames.“ Some of them are four years old and have been producing daily and you cannot tell them apart from the second stock, which is about one year old.
