Electricity produced from cow dung is making Barsana’s Radha Rani temple self-sufficient

P.C. Amar Ujala

Barsana, 2018.02.05 (VT) Barsana now has Asia’s biggest plant for generating gas and electricity from cow dung. Ramesh Baba’s Mataji Goshala is utilizing the dung (gobar) from its 45,000 cows to produce biogas and electricity.

The state of the art gobar gas plant has been undergoing trials for the last four months. The plant is currently producing enough electricity to supply the Goshala’s own needs and supply Radha Rani Temple (Maan Mandir). Plans to supply electricity to the town of Barsana are being discussed.

The plant processes 13 tonnes of gobar per day which is produced by the goshala’s 40,000 cows, from which 13,000 cubic metres of biogas and 16,000 units of electricity are produced every day. Plant manager, IIT Engineer Chandramohan said that harmful gasses such as carbon dioxide are filtered out of the gas.

Home gobar gas plant, P.C. swadeshikheti.com

With the recent increases in the price of cooking gas due to the withdrawal of the Government subsidy, more and more people are looking for alternatives to purchasing LPG cylinders. It is estimated that over 2 million households in India already have their own gobar gas plants which create cooking gas, however, there are several problems with the home-gobar-gas-plant model. The gas that is produced from home gobar gas units is unfiltered and often only allows for cooking on low flame. Mostly people do not cook rotis with this gas. The home-based plants depend on the availability of land to build a pit to keep wet gobar and are not completely reliable as weather and other environmental conditions can effect the amount of gas produced.

Having a centralized gobar gas plant that can sell gas and electricity back to the town overcomes many of the limitations of home-gas-plants and is a big step forward in the move towards renewable energy sources.