A new process could allow rice waste to be converted to generate enough electricity to power every home in Indonesia, with more to spare.
The country produces around 100 million tonnes of rice straw annually, with around 60% of this waste being burned in open fields.
This is not only wasteful, but it also contributes to air pollution that has been linked to lung cancer.
It’s estimated that the energy released through this burning could power Indonesia’s homes ten times over, if it could be fully harnessed.
There is always some waste in any energy conversion process of course, but researchers are currently working on a new method to efficiently capture energy from the straw on a large commercial scale.
Part of the technique involves pyrolysis, which is a biomass conversion technology in which organic materials are heated to a very high temperature of around 500°C.
This breaks the waste products down into vapour and solids, with some of the vapour able to be condensed into a liquid product known as pyrolysis oil.
Both this bio-oil and the rice straw vapour itself can be used to generate electricity.
Current methods are only able to convert around a third (35%) of the straw’s thermal energy into affordable electricity.
New technique could double the energy converted
The researchers say that their new combustion engine can double this far more efficiently to an output closer to 70% of the thermal energy.
Lead researcher Dr Jude Onwudili said the combination of technologies in this project had huge potential in several different areas.
This new combustion engine is expected to lead to economic benefits and job creation, as well as bringing power to those currently without it.
Dr Onwudili said that around a million homes currently do not have access to electricity in Indonesia and the make-up of the nation – spread across 6,000 inhabited islands – made infrastructure projects very challenging in some places.
This is the case on the remote island of Lombok, which is situated to the east of Bali.
Dr Onwudili said that the newly developed process could reduce environmental pollution and contribute to efforts to reach net zero.
More importantly, she continued, it could provide access to affordable energy for many people from waste that was both sustainable and locally produced.
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