Biogas: Fuel of the future

Once considered an intermediate technology fit only for the underprivileged "Third
World", biogas is now generating interest in the West as a cheap, renewable source for
energy.

Prabha K. Singh

Gimmicky as it may sound, That pledge betrays a genuine anxiety, based ironically enough, on
the very success of the biogas experiment. Though still in its infancy, the 50,000 plants installed
under the Khadi and Village Industries Commission's (KVIC) biogas program are already
producing 99.82 million cubic meter of gas, equivalent to 62 million liter of kerosene valued at
Rs 62.49 million, and 11.20 lakh tons of high quality organic manure worth Rs 50.86 million.

Not surprisingly, a number of the farmers, suddenly catapulted into unaccustomed wealth,
reacted as if their families were under siege. A typical complaint was the one made by an Uttar
Pradesh villager who said: "The women in my house no longer work. They don't make dung
cakes, collect firewood every woman is becoming a queen by herself. The added income from
the farm causes jealousy and when we white-washed the house last month and installed a gas
light, we found we were isolated from the entire village. The only way out now is to dig up my
plant or make sure my neighbors get one."

Fortunately for the old man, his plea was answered by Jashbhai J. Patel, then technical advisor to
the KVIC. "That man eventually helped us install 450 plants in the area," recalls Patel, whose
pioneering work earned him international recognition as the undisputed "father of biogas
technology".

Cheap Source: The case for biogas is undeniable. Once considered an intermediate technology
fit only for the underprivileged "Third World", biogas is now generating interest in the West as a
cheap, renewable source for energy.

Germany which built the first plants in 1947 and abandoned research after some initial failure,
recently sent a four member delegation headed by Dr Gunther Hilliges, of the Bremen Overseas
Research and Development Association, to aid and study the successful Indian experiment.

"Although discovered in 1870, biogas would have remained an obsolete technology in the West,"
Dr Hilliges told India Today, "if it wasn't for the oil price hike of 1974. Suddenly farmers all
over Germany are sending us letters regarding the possible installation of plants."

The team, which studied a number of villages in India, is planning to publish a handbook in
several African, Asian and South American languages "promoting the enormous developmental
advantages of these plants."

Fuel: An average family of five requires 50 cubic feet of gas per day for cooking and providing
four hours of light between sunset and early morning. To feed a plant this size, however, the
family needs at least five heads of cattle, each producing approximately 13 cubic feet of gas per
day.

Predictably, 60 per cent of the plants belonged to rich farmers owning more than four hectares of
irrigated land and of the rest, only 11 per cent were owned by farmers having less than five
cattle. The poorest, landless farmers were suddenly denied access to the now precious dung
cakes.

A village housewife - city comforts

"One way out of the problem," said Patel, "was to build a community plant." The Council for
Industrial and Scientific Research (CISR) built the first one in Kodumunju village in the
Karimnagar district of Andhra Pradesh. Constructed at a cost of Rs 85,000, the plant produces
about 4,480 cubic feet of gas per day to meet the requirements of 12 to 15 families.

Other Benefits: An unexpected bonus was the dramatic improvement in health and hygiene.
Says Patel: "There was a time when we could tell we were approaching the village from the
characteristic, overpowering stench of festering faces. Now that we have built community toilets
to feed the plant along with other night-soil and agricultural refuse, flies and mosquitoes have
almost disappeared - as have most stomach and intestinal disorders, trachoma and malaria."

Since then, several villages have put up community plants, most notably in the Kaira (Amul
dairy) region of Gujarat where landless, caste shepherds own milk cattle. So successful was the
venture that a businessman, M.V. Patel, has decided to operate a commercial plant. Half his dung
requirements are purchased from local shepherds and the by-products - fuel and fertilizer - are
sold at a substantial profit.

Of the estimated 980 million tons of cattle dung available in the country, 30 per cent is burnt in
the form of cakes, most of it in the Gangetic plain. How wasteful this method of cooking is, was
revealed in an experiment which showed that only 11 per cent of the heat potential of the dung
was utilized, the rest being turned to ashes. If on the other hand, the entire amount of dung was
fed into gas plants, it would produce 36,260 million cubic meter of gas, enough for the fuel
requirements of 87.45 families.

Saving: Further, of the 0.25 tons of coal equivalent used as domestic fuel in India, at least 34.4
per cent consists of wood, dry leaves and agricultural wastes. The introduction of biogas would
directly affect this 34 per cent of the rural population thus saving, at a conservative estimate, Rs
400 crore of valuable wood annually.

"This is one way of halting deforestation and enjoying the ecological benefits accruing from it -
increased rainfall, less soil erosion and the preservation of rapidly disappearing wildlife," said
Professor R. Guldager who has worked with bio-gas plants in Somalia and Ethiopia and now
heads a department for development and settlement at the Technical University, Braunschweig.
Indeed, so promising are the fuel possibilities that "the proper recycling of waste can produce as
much energy as the nation's entire consumption of oil," said a former managing director of
Indian Oil.
Added to this is the attraction of free, high quality organic manure. So rich is the humus and
nitrogen content of the manure that unsuspecting farmers reaped double the yield in root crops
such as potatoes, carrots and turnips. Studies undertaken by the Humus Institute revealed a
number of instances where the introduction of nitrogenous manure doubled the vegetable yield
per acre. "Organic manure is free from weeds, white ants, soil grubs and is the only way of
improving the basic structure of the soil," said Patel, "whereas, chemical fertilizer works in a
lopsided fashion."

Fertility: A study undertaken by Professor A.K.N. Reddy of the Indian Institute of Science,
Bangalore, demonstrated the tremendous economic and developmental advantages of biogas
manure as against chemical fertilizers. To produce 2,30,000 tons of nitrogen annually, a nation
could either build one coal-based plant or 26,150 small, village level biogas plants.

The former would cost $140 million (Rs 136 crore) to build, half of it in foreign exchange, and
would consume coal equivalent to the energy requirements of 550 villages. The latter would cost
$15 million (Rs 13.5 crore) less, would require no foreign exchange, be able to use renewable
energy resources and would be environmentally sounder, as it is non-polluting. Further, it could
be brought to production within a matter of months, given the right organization as against the
couple of years required to build a big plant.

Moreover, the benefits of development would be spread more evenly in 26,150 centers rather
than being concentrated in one area. The biogas plants, for instance, would generate 130 times as
much employment in the most backward areas.

Undoubtedly, biogas can become a major energy source for rural India and give much needed
impetus to rural development. It remains to be seen whether the much-vaunted rural programs of
the Janata Government would exploit its full potentials.