India-New by product from abattoirs.

INDIA-More than 200 slaughterhouses in Uttar Pradesh, in Northern India will have biogas plants within a year.

This will happen if the plans of the Uttar Pradesh Pollution Control Board (UPPCB) go according to plans.

They will use the waste that now make the environment around the slaughterhouses filthy and convert it into electricity and manure.

Financial benefits

Besides producing electricity for the in-house use of the slaughterhouses, the organic manure produced as a by-product will also reap in financial benefits..

"A survey was conducted very recently in over 200 slaughterhouses of 72 districts and the idea of installing biogas plants was found to be most suitable and feasible," said G.N. Garg, chief environment engineer of UPPCB.

According to Garg, the idea came when owners of a slaughterhouse in Unnao district approached the UPPCB.

Technique popular in other countries

"The modern slaughterhouse in Unnao imported the biogas installation from New Zealand and after finding it both economically and environmentally better, they approached us with the idea," Garg stated. The technique is popular in New Zealand and The Netherlands, he added.

"We plan to produce methane gas by using a mixture of blood and dung which will in turn be used to produce electricity for internal use," Explain Garg further.

The waste will be recycled a number of times and finally will be used to produce organic manure, he added.

Costs and installations

Garg also said that,"The cost of one plant installation is Rs.15,000-20,000 which is nearly equal to a year’s electricity bill of a slaughterhouse.

Besides, the organic manure will also generate good profits. We have promised full assistance to owners right from making the units available and installing them."

Biogas plant within in a year

"Indirectly, we have warned the slaughterhouses that we’ll make pollution control norms more stringent if they do not adopt the idea. Now they are volunteering themselves and have initiated the process," Garg said.

Garg was positive, seeing the possibility that each slaughterhouse in Uttar Pradesh would have a biogas plant within a year.