Conversion of crop residual waste in to fuel for thermal plants and fertilizer for farmers

Abstract

The conversion of solid waste (dry leafs and dry seeds) into fuel and fertilizer is an idea for educating and mobilizing the farmers to stop the burning of crop residue seasonally. In India it is a common practise for the farmers to fire the crop residue after the cultivation is completed by which air and soil pollution is increasing. The idea here is to convert that crop residue (waste) into a useful form by pulverising and blending in a ratio. In this work the emphasis is made on rice stubble, wheat stubble, cotton stubble, neem leafs and Moringa oleifera leafs. In addition to them rice husk, dry neem seeds, tamarind seeds, Indian date seeds and agro waste seeds are used. The produced fuel (in powder form) has found a calorific value of 4180 Kcal/Kg and the fertilizer has shown the typical value of nitrogen in nitrate form is 24.94%, phosphorous in phosphate form of 12.35% and potassium of 61.75%. This work makes an arena to the farmers to stop burning the crop residue (agro waste) and substantially converting it into the fuel and fertilizer.