From straw to fuel
Progressive farmer Sukbir Singh Dhaliwal, 46, is scripting a success story with his venture that converts crop waste into products that can be used as fuel in industries. Dhaliwal and some of his friends began the start-up, Farm2Energy, in 2016 to convert paddy stubble into bio-coal. Bio-coal is a carbon-neutral fuel that can replace ordinary coal in industrial processes.
Last year, he and fellow entrepreneurs Kamaljeet Singh, Sandeep Singh Shergill and Preet Singh Chandoke lifted stubble residue from 20,000 acre.
Over the past four years, they have also set up a pellet-making factory in Khanna. “Not only paddy residue, our unit processes paddy straw, corn stover, sugarcane trash and wheat straw and supplies it to biofuel, bio-power and bio-based industries. We also help farmers in managing biomass,” said Dhaliwal. “The industry has huge potential, as the world is progressing towards cleaner energy solutions,” he claimed.
“The automobile industry is concentrating on Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), and stubble can be used to make it. Due to the lack of any government initiative, such ventures are not coming up. We are sitting on a gold-mine of opportunities. We are burning it away and polluting the environment. Farmers cannot be blamed as they have limited resources,” added Dhaliwal.
This year, the chances of him getting the raw material are bleak. Many farmers who had converted to crop residue management have yet again cleared their fields by burning. The majority of the farmers are either protesting on railway tracks or selling the crop in mandis, triggering labour shortage. “We are facing problems in collecting residue as farmers are angry,” added Dhaliwal.