Clementine Chambon

Shortlisted for the WISE Tech Start-up Award 2015

12 November 2015

Clementine Chambon, Co-Founder / CTO, Oorja: Empowering Rural Communities

Social enterprise Oorja’s core mission is to help empower rural communities in India that lack access to reliable electricity, and to help develop sustainable agriculture. It aims to do this by converting locally available crop waste into affordable electricity and a soil amendment. Clementine, a PhD researcher in bioenergy at Imperial College, London, has led a team of students to devise a prototype of a waste-to-energy plant which co-produces renewable energy and biochar. Oorja will build, install and maintain the plants which, crucially, will be owned and operated by local entrepreneurs and women's groups. A year on from Oorja's inception, Clementine and her co-founder Amit Saraogi have raised over $100,000, galvanised support in India and internationally and has been awarded a prestigious Echoing Green Climate Fellowship. She says: “Girls need to see all the creative things that you can do as a scientist or an engineer."