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Greater awareness of anaerobic digestion benefits at farm level needed

Greater awareness of anaerobic digestion benefits at farm level needed

A survey conducted to assess farmers’ willingness to adopt anaerobic digestion has identified a potential knowledge gap at farm level in terms of the benefits this technology can bring.

Speaking from the Catchment Science 2023 Conference last week, Sadhbh Mahony, a Sustainability Data Technician working in the FLEET Project, provided a background to anaerobic digestion, including its benefits, while also disseminating the results of a survey completed last year.

Anaerobic digestion (AD), she commented, has been identified as a technology that can produce renewable energy from agricultural waste along with silage, while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions. AD would improve Irish farmers’ management of waste, produce a more effective fertiliser from organic manures and provide an extra source of revenue for farmers.

Under the Climate Action Plan, Ireland has set a target of producing 5.7TWh of biomethane from anaerobic digestion by 2030. To achieve this, feed stocks such as silage and slurries will be required from farms to feed AD plants.

Aiming to assess farmers’ willingness to adopt anaerobic digestion, a survey was provided to farmers involved in the National Farm Survey in 2022 to get an accurate representation of farmers nationally.

“Why farmers? Because farmers would be the primary adopters of anaerobic digestion as they would be the ones producing and supplying these feed stocks to reach the target of 5.7TWh of biomethane,” Sadhbh explained.

Farmers were asked a series of questions including: would they supply silage, would they supply slurry, would they produce silage using multispecies or clover or would they receive digestate or join a co-operative?

Outlining the initial findings, Sadhbh said over 62% of farmers were not willing to participate in adopting AD. Whereas, 20% of farmers were willing to adopt AD. The majority of farmers were not willing to supply slurry, silage or join a co-operative. However receiving the fertiliser, in the form of digestate that comes from the AD plant, had a higher percentage uptake of 46%. As part of this work, different farm systems and sizes were examined and the preliminary results showed no differences.

Commenting on the results of the survey, Sadhbh said: “This gives us an indication that the majority of farmers have overlooked this new technology and the benefits it has for them. The results from the survey showed maybe farmers are unsure of the new technology; they may require more information and knowledge and there needs to be more information and awareness on anaerobic digestion for farmers to adopt this new technology.

“A better insight into the factors is needed to understand the barriers and obstacles farmers face in adopting AD,” she said.

Concluding on a positive note though, Sadhbh said that the farmers willing to adopt are representative of about 25% of the total farming population, which is sufficient to produce the feed stocks required to achieve the Climate Action Plan target of producing 5.7TWh of biomethane from anaerobic digestion by 2030.

Also read: Developing an Irish biomethane industry

Also read: Agriculture's role in biomethane production

Also read: Catchment Science 2023