IT SOUNDS too good to be true. How can a bunch of pipes in a huge lake provide electric power for much of Rwanda, help revive its devastated forests and quell the danger of a bizarre natural disaster?
The answer is sitting on Rwanda’s north-western border, where the deep waters of Lake Kivu are brimming with vast quantities of three dissolved gases: carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulphide and methane. The CO2 and hydrogen sulphide come mainly from volcanic activity, while the methane comes from lake bed bacteria. Engineers are now planning to suck out the methane and burn it…
