Gobar Gas

With the United Nations and other international bodies making a priority of battling destructive climate change, countries all over the world are discovering new alternatives to fossil fuels. Sometimes, new recourse is found in things that have been available to humanity from the dawn of time, like wind and sun rays. Decaying organic matter is much the same: decomposing leaves and grasses; aging animal remains and waste; rotting food and byproducts; as well as sewage and wastewater are all sources of usable energy that power electrical grids and fuels automobiles and trucks. The energy is biogas or, in India, gobar gas.

Where does it come from?

When the materials mentioned above are bereaved of oxygen, bacteria begins to break them down into myriad chemical compounds. As this process — known as anaerobic digestion — runs its course, it yields end products, principally methane and carbon dioxide. It is the methane (CH4) that is the fruitful compound in that it can be burned in combustion engines to either actuate the generation of electricity or propel vehicles of varying sizes and designs. Anaerobic digestion has been a natural phenomenon forever but technology can hasten this sequence of events to create more biogas, ridding it of its impurities. Biogas is noticeable when passing longstanding leaf piles or grass clipping masses. The odor emanating from these heaps originates at the bottom where no oxygen can penetrate. Little do people know the great potential that lies in such stench. Fortunately, scientific knowledge is at a place where the conditions at the base of that leaf pile can be replicated quickly and repeatedly. The inputs or substrate — often livestock manure, wastewater or other sorts of compost — are fed into an oxygen-free tank whereby the substrate is disintegrated and the biogas rises to the top and is captured for processing. The apprehended biogas often contains chemical compounds that threaten human health, the durability of pipelines and the overall performance efficiency of the biogas. Thus, various means of cleansing the gas are employed during the processing phase. The residual solids — or digestate — is useful as crop fertilizer, feed additive, bedding and organic pesticide agents.

Is it widely available in India?

The use of gobar gas has enormous implications for a nation-state like India. Millions of homes in India burn wood — about five kilograms daily on average — for heating and cooking. Although wood is sometimes classified as carbon-neutral, the volume at which it is consumed outpaces natural restoration. This massive activity hastens both deforestation and greenhouse gas emission. The good news is that private endowments and non-governmental organizations are working to equip households with biogas plants. An estimated 4,000 dwellings in India now have access to such small-scale production units. More broadly, India is the third largest importer of petroleum in the world. Others are working to lower this statistic by exploiting the huge amount of agricultural waste generated in India every day. Hence the emergence of commercial-scale biogas and gobar gas plants that convert the effluvium to electricity for use in commerce and industry. The future of biogas in India will largely depend on the investment in infrastructure. The government hopes to construct 5,000 new gobar gas plants to achieve a national goal of 36 percent of total energy production. An additional benefit is in the management of agricultural waste. According to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), India is the planet's largest milk producer, equating to millions of heads of cattle. With wise and sufficient investment, Indian dairy farmers can offload surplus manure at a profit. Furthermore, the ash digestate from methane extraction is often a more nutritious fertilizer than the raw manure itself.