Where there’s a need there’s a way. And with load shedding waiting to pounce round every corner, food producers and related industries have been quick to find ways to keep their production plants rolling, with chicken farming coming to the fore in waste-to-energy processing right here in Worcester. Yes, they are using chicken waste to produce on-site electricity and relieve pressure on the national grid at RCL Foods.
Who would have thought the humble chicken could assist us to keep the global wheels of civilisation turning in so many different ways?
In the USA, chicken feathers are being used by three leading companies for absorbent feather-based products, such as diapers (nappies), filters, insulation, upholstery padding, paper, and even clothing, while their organic waste is processed for animal feed and the keratin (protein) in them helps strengthen the structure of plastics.
And, of course, their feathers and waste can be used to make compost for agricultural purposes and domestic gardening.
In Worcester, apart from contributing their nutritious eggs and meat to help feed the nation, their waste products are being used to power-up their own on-site waste-to-energy conversion plant which, in turn, produces biogas for electricity to help power the process.
The procedure
Using chicken waste to advantage, the waste-to-energy plant produces biogas from organic waste through the biological process of anaerobic digestion. This is then used to generate electricity and clean hot water to meet all non-food and non-feed-contact purposes on site.
So through self-generated waste-to-energy procedures chickens are enabling Worcester’s well-known poultry farm company to provide on-site electricity through the waste-to-biogas process – reducing usage from the national energy grid, and the greenhouse gas emissions caused by using coal.
With current national supply problems and escalating electricity bills, with no foreseeable solutions in sight, self-generated power through biogas production, solar photovoltaic systems, wind or biomass systems are helping reduce the demand on the nation’s grid and, in some cases, to give back, while also reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.
Biogas
Established two years before the Covid-19 pandemic first began to rear its head at the end of 2019, and quietly getting on with the job ever since, Worcester’s chicken feathers and waste plant processes about 2 000 cubic metres of organic liquid waste over a seven-day period. This includes fats and proteins that are then put through an anaerobic digester to convert into high methane biogas, which is now producing about 150 000 kW of electricity per week.
The company has also ensured the highest air quality in the surrounding area by investing in a handling system that treats all the air coming from rendering through bio-filters and ultraviolet light and then polishing it with an ozone system.
Explains Cassie Maree, manager of the partnering company orchestrating the chicken waste-to-energy procedure, “The first plant was based in Tigane in North West as proof of concept. This was followed by the Worcester plant with the scale and offerings increased, and lastly in Rustenburg.
Further developments around the world have also been incorporated into Worcester’s phase-2 initiative, which are now showing promise in osmosis and solid waste processing for fertilisers.”
There are currently three such plants in South Africa, with another due in Mauritius.
