Suzuki Motor Eyeing Cow Feces for Biogas Fuel in India
New Delhi, Jan. 15 (Jiji Press)--Japan's Suzuki Motor Corp. is making full-fledged efforts to produce biogas fuel for automobiles using cow feces in India.
The automaker is focusing on means other than electric vehicles to realize carbon neutrality, or reducing greenhouse gas emissions to net zero.
Suzuki Motor President Toshihiro Suzuki and other company executives visited a rural area in the state of Gujarat, western India, on Dec. 25 last year.
They inspected a dairy farm where feces of cows being grown are collected and put into a fermentation tank to extract methane gas for use as fuel for cooking at home. The fecal residue is used as organic fertilizer.
The farm is part of a test model village run by a subsidiary of the National Dairy Development Board, an Indian government agency involved in installing and managing biogas plants.
Suzuki Motor is working on a project in which it buys cow feces, which are often discarded, from dairy farmers to extract methane using a method similar to the one adopted at the farm, and uses the gas as an alternative fuel for compressed natural gas, or CNG, vehicles.
The automaker plans to launch five biogas plants in Gujarat, of which two are set to go online in summer. The biogas fuel will be sold at filling stations attached to the plants.
Suzuki Motor has inked an investment agreement with the board's unit, planning to expand the biogas operation across India in cooperation with major dairy associations.
Cow feces generate methane, which has about 28 times the warming effect of carbon dioxide. Burning the gas can prevent its release into the atmosphere.
Feces from 10 cows in a single day can fuel a CNG vehicle for a whole day.
India is estimated to be home to 300 million cows, meaning that 30 million CNG vehicles can be fueled using their feces in theory. Suzuki Motor accounts for more than 70 pct of CNG vehicle sales in India.
At the dairy farm visited by company executives, cow feces solidified in the shape of a disk were dried in the sun. In rural India, such feces are traditionally used as fuel for cooking, so there is no resistance to the use of cow feces.
"It is highly effective in boosting rural areas," Suzuki said of the company's project. "We need to cooperate and contribute to the development of India."
While the automaker is considering rolling out similar projects in other countries, the Indian scheme focuses more on contributing to society, and it is yet uncertain whether it can be profitable.
Suzuki's father, company adviser Osamu, who led Suzuki Motor's foray into the Indian market, died in Japan on the day of the visit.
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