How to Make Fuel Pellets from Cow Dung

A single farm may produce a score or more tons of cow manure per day, the cow dung can pollute the environment and our water source seriously without reasonable and timely processing. Besides, it is also a great waste of resources. More than 2 billion people across the planet burn dried animal dung for energy. It is cheap, and it can be found in areas where wood is scarce. It is renewable, and it contains a reasonable amount of energy. However, burning it directly is a different matter and less energy can be extracted. Cow dung has an energy density of approximately 12 MJ/kg if burned with 100% efficiency. Therefore, how to make full use of this resource becomes extremely important.

Why Recycle the Waste Cow Dung into Fuel Pellets?
In fact, the cow dung is a valuable resource for people in pellets production field. You might wonder why people would pelletize the cow manure, two very good reasons drive their utilization. First, cow manure is generally considered as a renewable energy source and it can be burned as “green power,” thus reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Second, some cities and regions have limited landfills or waste treatment capacity, and recycling the waste can reduce the load on their waste disposal facilities. Another benefit from pelletizing these waste products is the tax credits for using renewable energy sources and good public relations karma. Still another benefit is that recycling the cow dung can prevent its decomposition into methane, a greenhouse gas that is much worse for the environment than carbon dioxide. Therefore, recycling the waste cow dung into fuel pellets is not only the perfect solution to the disposal of waste cow manure, but another profit for the farmers. And most importantly, the cow dung fuel pellet is a kind of clean and renewable energy source, and it can completely replace the coal, oil, natural gas, etc.

How to Make the Cow Dung Fuel Pellets?
1. Cow dung drying: different from making other biomass fuel pellets, the first step for making cow manure fuel pellets would be drying. Because there is too much water contained in the cow manure. If crush the cow manure first, the too wet manure may probably block the crushing machine. After drying, the moisture of mature is decreased to below 15%.
2. Manure crushing: after drying, the manure will become loose and can be processed by the crushing machine. The crushing machine will pulverize the cow dung into powder with the diameter of 2-5mm.
3. Manure pelletizing: when the manure powder is fed into the manure pellet machine, it will be pressed by the great pressure inside the pellet machine. Then manure fuel pellets are made. Ring die pellet mill and flat die pellet mill are available for your selection. Whether to choose the small one or large one depends on your own needs.
4. Pellets cooling: cow dung fuel pellets discharged from the pellet mill are high in temperature and moisture content, then goes the cooling step. After that, the pellets can be burned in the boiler, or used as fertilizer in soil. The pellets can also be sieved when cooling, so that poor quality pellets and powder materials will be collected and reproduced.
5. Pellets packaging: once the cow dung fuel pellets are formed and cooled, they can be packaged in bags or stored in bulk.

What is the Advantages of Cow Dung Fuel Pellets?
1. Low cost & high additional value
The fuel pellets are high in calorific value, and the cost of using is much less than that of oil energy. The ash after burning contains magnesium, potassium and sodium, which makes it be a superior inorganic fertilizer.
2. High bulk density, convenient transportation
After pelletizing, the density of cow dung pellets is greatly increased, more than 0.8-1.3. Small volume, large specific gravity and density, convenient to store and transport, and continuous usage.
3. Green energy, clean and environment protection
Cow dung fuel pellet is a kind of green energy. There is no smoke, smell and harmful gas generated when burning the pellets. After testing, sulphur content, ash content, and nitrogen content are far less than that of coal, oil, etc. Therefore, the cow dung fuel pellets are also called zero emission energy.
4. High efficiency & energy saving
It is also high in carbon activity and volatile matter, ash content is only 1/20 of coal. And the waste heat in ash is extremely low, the combustion ratio can reach up to more than 98%, therefore, the burning time is longer.
5. Wide application, strong practicality
The cow dung fuel pellets can be widely applied to industrial and agricultural production, electricity generation, heat supply, boiler firing, cooking, etc. Raw materials supply is not restricted by area, particularly suitable for the energy lacking areas.

Technical Parameters of Cow Dung Fuel Pellets

What kind of Manure Pellets Can be Made in Our Pellet Machine?
1. Poultry manure pellets: poultry manure (chicken manure in particular) can provide boron and a lot of trace minerals, like N, P, K, etc. Therefore, poultry manure pellet is a superior source of soil organic fertilizer. And the pellet form also makes it more convenient to use. However, if you want to use poultry manure pellets as fuel, you must bear their unpleasant smell.
2. Livestock manure pellets: horse, cow and sheep manure pellets can be made from both animal manure and waste animal bedding. Because animal manure contains straw or stalk with high energy content, the pellets made from it can be good source of fuel. You can use the manure pellets in heating boiler. And if you do not care about the smell, you can use the manure pellets at home. For those who raise livestock, it is a profitable way to make manure into pellets and then burned in boiler.