The blocks produced at the waste disposal factory belonging to the Moranbong district urban beautification station are much sought after.

Its lead developer is Kim Kwang Chol, diffuser at the Moranbong District Committee of Pyongyang Municipality of the General Federation of Science and Technology of Korea.

The construction sector seems to be unrelated to Kim who had worked at the pharmaceutical sector under the Ministry of Public Health.

“But it was not unfamiliar to me. Most of my inventions are additives that are closely connected with chemistry. Chemistry forms the basis of pharmacology I majored in,” said Kim.

Such cross-disciplinary science was no problem to him as he had studied hard during his days at Sariwon College of Koryo Pharmacology.

While doing his pharmaceutical job, he paid attention to recycling urban waste.

To safely dispose of different kinds of household refuse while preventing environmental pollution is a matter of great social concern.

He volunteered to resolve it and buckled down to research into recycling urban waste. In the course of this, he channelled his main efforts into developing additives.

He succeeded in developing an additive for waste disposal by drawing on his experience of making a concrete accelerator using waste from the Sangwon Cement Complex. And by putting the additive into such solid waste as coal cinders he completed the block for construction.

Though no cement is mixed, the block is as hard as the ordinary block made from cement and gravels and it costs one tenth of that. The method of building this block was soon introduced in the Moranbong district urban beautification station and transferred to other stations in the city.

Encouraged by the success, he stepped up a study of the recycling of plastic waste which takes a large proportion in urban rubbish.

In this course, he developed different kinds of adhesives, oil coating material and filling material for vehicle painting.

In particular, the adhesives for manufacturing plywood, plastic goods and ironware are turned out without heating and using any electrical method, but their qualitative indices are ensured and they cause no pollution, thus attracting the attention of experts.

He expanded his research from recycling to the development of various kinds of detergents and rust inhibitor for vehicles and the study of the bounce of table-tennis ball as well.

All his studies are based on locally-available materials. For instance, he developed a method of substituting wild grass abundant in local hills for foaming agent and dispersant which constitute major qualitative indices of various detergents.

“While continuing invention for 10 years, I came to realize that the resources in our country are all treasures,” Kim said.

Everything should be made from domestic materials and using no or less funds, electricity and special facilities—this is the rule he maintains in his invention.

That’s why his developments are always welcomed by users and everyone regards him as a treasure, said Paek Chol Hun, secretary general of the committee.

Today many people visit him to ask for advice from across the country.