washington business
in contact with water and sanitation leaders from nearly
every nation on the planet.
The machine isn’t ready for delivery yet, but as they
deploy the first prototype to western Africa and work on
a second, larger model, they have a plan to quickly ramp
up development at a sophisticated new facility in a historic
Sedro-Woolley complex.
from boats to aerospace to clean water
As of press time, the goal was to have it operating before
the fifth annual African Water Week conference in late May
— which by happy coincidence is taking place in the same city.
Even while the Omni Processor was going through
customs, Aaron Janicki was meeting with governmental
ministers, university professors and mayors of towns eager
for an Omni Processor of their own.
“It’s definitely making a huge impact and a big impression
over here,” he told Washington Business by phone from
Dakar. “There’s a lot of excitement.”
The biggest interest, he said, is in turning waste
processing from a parasitic cost center of government into
a profit center — spinning straw into gold.
The Omni Processor is the first major project of Janicki
Bioenergy, which is a new offshoot of the company Peter
and his wife founded in 1993, Janicki Industries.
After starting in marine industry tooling and transitioning
to aerospace, Janicki Industries — winner of AWB’s
2012 Manufacturer of the Year award — began
working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
about three years ag