Sustainable Energy for Rural Development

 

Anil K. Rajvanshi

Director

Nimbkar Agricultural Research Institute (NARI)

  PHALTAN-415523, Maharashtra

 E-mail: anilrajvanshi@gmail.com

 

(A talk given at PAN IIT 2006 meet in Mumbai on 24 December 2006)

 

 

Introduction

 

It is a matter of shame that after 60 years of independence around 60% of our rural population live in very primitive conditions.  Consider the following:

 

1)      They have no electricity and their lives are in darkness.  They use inefficient kerosene lanterns for light and primitive and ancient biomass cook stoves for cooking.  Modern technology somehow has not touched their lives.  Besides their poor quality, these devices used by them create tremendous household pollution. Thus there are estimates that around 1.5 million deaths per year in rural areas are attributable to inhaling smoke from the inefficient and primitive biomass stoves.

 

2)      Around 54% of India’s population is below 25 years of age and most of them live in rural areas and are unemployed. Creation of rural based enterprises is the best way to create wealth, improve their quality of life and bring these people into mainstream of development.  Our leaders are talking about making India the third biggest economy by 2012.  Unless the lives of rural population are improved this will not be possible.    

 

3)      There is tremendous poverty in rural areas.  Continuous suicides of farmers attests to it.  In the last 10 years about 1,20,000 farmers have committed suicide. Farming is presently non-remunerative.  This is partly because of the policy of low support price for farm produce by the Government of India, which is the biggest buyer of agricultural commodities. Secondly, increased aspirations of farmers to improve their quality of life has made them get into never ending debts of loan sharks. Thus no amount of soft financial packages will prevent the farmers’ suicides or help the marginal farmers. These are all short-term solutions.  There is a Chinese saying “You can feed a person for a short time by supplying him fish, but if you teach him how to catch fish he will feed himself the rest of his life”. Thus if we create a long term agricultural policy which brings in wealth to the countryside without much government support, then automatically the farmers’ lot will become better and will help in rural development. 

 

4)      There is a serious energy crisis in India.  In various states there is tremendous shortage of electricity.  Thus in Maharashtra (one of the most industrialized state of India) about 4000 MW peak shortfall exists.  Blackouts and brownouts is a regular feature of daily life.  Besides this India imported about Rs. 1,30,000 crores worth of petroleum products this year.  With ever increasing price of crude this number will increase in coming years and will put a heavy burden on balance of payment account. 

 

All the above problems can hopefully be solved by producing energy through agriculture route.  The farming can become remunerative only when it is tied very closely to industry. This can happen when farms also produce energy besides food. Thus when the major demand of fuel and electricity of the country is met by the farm then wealth will automatically flow into rural areas.

 

Energy Solutions

 

Three types of fuels can be produced easily via agriculture – liquid fuels like ethanol or biodiesel; gaseous fuels like methane; and electricity. These fuels can be used for transportation, electricity production and motive power for industries.  

 

The ethanol liquid fuel can be produced from sugar producing agricultural crops like sweet sorghum, sugarbeet, sugarcane etc. while biodiesel can be produced from a horde of oil producing crops like Jatropha, Karanja, Castor etc.  Estimates are that agriculture-based liquid fuel industry can be of an order of about Rs. 40-50,000 crores/year thereby providing increasing wealth to farmers.

 

In any agriculture only 25-40% of the produce is food. Rest 60-75% are the agricultural residues.  Residues can produce electricity (via biomass-based power plants); ethanol fuel (via enzymatic hydrolysis process); and diesel (via high temperature pyrolysis route). Any marginal farm can produce agricultural residues even if the main food crop fails.  On an average a farmer can get an extra income of Rs. 2000-4000/acre from the residues alone if they are used for producing energy.  This income can give him benefits even in case of a distress sale of his crop.

 

Today about 600 million tons/year of agricultural residues are produced in India.  Most of these residues are burnt in the fields as a solution to the waste disposal problem. This not only wastes the precious resource but also produces tremendous air pollution. Theoretically these residues can produce 80,000 MW of electric power year round.  This is around 60% of the total installed electricity capacity of India.  Part of these agricultural residues can also be used via the methane (biogas) route to produce fertilizer for the crops and gaseous fuel to either run rural transport, irrigation pumpsets or be used as cooking gas. Similarly agricultural residues can be used to produce diesel via fast pyrolysis process.  The production of electricity via residues will require an investment of about Rs. 160,000 crores.  However it will bring about 10 times more money to rural areas in terms of revenues from electricity generation.  Besides it can potentially create almost 120 million extra jobs in rural areas.

 

As the industrial demand for fuels and electricity increases, we might see large tracts of farmland coming under fuel crops and food production may suffer.  Thus there is a need to debate the food vs. fuel issues.  Consequently R&D needs to be done on crops, which produce both fuel and food from the same piece of land. Sweet sorghum is one such crop.  Nimbkar Agricultural Research Institute (NARI) pioneered the development of this crop in India.  Sweet sorghum produces food (jowar grain) from its earhead, fuel from its stem (the sweet juice can be fermented to produce ethanol) and bagasse and leaves make an excellent fodder for animals or they can also be used as fuel in power plants. Similarly if the agricultural residues can be broken down by suitable enzymes to produce ethanol then both food and fuel can be produced from all food crops.

 

Policy Issues

 

A policy has to be made by the Government of India that by 2015 AD around 80% of all our liquid fuel and 30-40% of all our electricity will have to be produced from renewables especially biomass.  This will result in tremendous growth in the farm sector and can provide a solution to the problems of the marginal farmers.  In recent times alcohol economy in Brazil and biogas economy in Europe (where about 3000 MW of electricity is produced from it) has brought prosperity to farmers in these countries.

 

For farming to increase so that it can carry the major load of food and energy production, adequate water supply has to be assured.  Thus there is a need to change the existing irrigation policy in which the Government owns most of the irrigation water bodies.  A new water act on the similar lines as the Electricity Act of 2003 needs to be enacted so that adequate water can be economically available for agriculture.

 

IITians can play can important role in rural development by setting up plants to produce liquid fuels and electricity. The technology exists.  What is needed is the desire to help the rural India. Most of the IITians are in corporate sector. Their involvement in rural development can be a shining example of how corporate sector, farmers, NGOs and local government can work together for Bharat Nirman.

 

When farms start supplying energy besides food it will generate additional wealth for 65% of the population who live in rural areas. Production of energy from agriculture will be the single most important step in bringing prosperity to rural India as well as energy security to the country.

 

 

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