From a fellowship application to a working biodigester in Assam. this is the unfiltered story of BioViL's first year.
With nothing but a conviction that India's villages deserved better than firewood, we applied to the beVisioneers Fellowship, the Mercedes-Benz Foundation's global programme for young sustainability innovators. This was day one of BioViL.
🏆 Fellowship ApplicationOut of hundreds of applicants, BioViL was selected for the beVisioneers Fellowship. The idea had passed its first test. Now came the harder part: making it real.
✅ AcceptedWe landed in rural Assam and spent weeks listening, not pitching. Village surveys revealed the true depth of the energy access problem: expensive LPG, toxic firewood smoke, and an untapped mountain of agricultural waste on every farm.
📍 Field Research · Assam, IndiaA local farmer agreed to partner with BioViL, allowing us to test and build our Minimum Viable Product on his land, in real conditions. This wasn't a lab experiment anymore. It was a commitment.
🤝 Formal PartnershipWe built our first prototype biodigester. It wasn't perfect, our initial monitoring system failed because farmers needed automation, not manual charts. We listened, rebuilt, and came back better.
🛠️ First PrototypeThe beVisioneers Fellowship awarded BioViL €3,000 in funding, enough to move from concept prototype to real-world installation. A small sum for the energy industry. A transformational one for us.
💰 Seed FundingWe launched the BioViL website, our platform to share progress, document learnings, attract collaborators, and spread awareness of what's possible when waste becomes energy.
🌐 Digital LaunchThe most important milestone yet. BioViL is constructing its first full-scale biodigester in Assam, turning a year of research, community relationships, and prototype learnings into clean energy for a real family, in a real village.
🌿 Active, Construction PhaseOur first fully operational biogas plant running independently in the village. generating clean energy, organic fertilizer, and steady income for the community.
Scale the project model to Stralsund, Germany, adapting our community-based anaerobic digestion approach to a new geographical and economic context.
Scale to 10 villages across Assam, proving that clean, community-owned biogas energy is both accessible and financially sustainable.
Building BioViL has not been a straight line. Our first monitoring prototype failed. Our community survey revealed assumptions we had to unlearn. We've had to ask hard questions about what "scale" really means for a rural community.
We document all of it, because honest progress, even when imperfect, is more valuable than polished marketing.
Read Our Research & Findings →Whether you're a farmer, a partner, or an investor, there's a place for you in this story.