PhilRice rice hull gasifier cuts down irrigation costs by 44%

SCIENCE CITY OF MUÑOZ, Nueva Ecija, Philippines — Farmers who use gasoline to run irrigation pumps in their farmlands can now heave a sigh of relief after a new rice hull gasifier engine-pump system developed by the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) was found to reduce irrigation costs by up to 44 percent and reduce environmental hazards.

The local mobile gasifier engine-pump system reduces irrigation costs up to 37 percent when using gasoline and 44 percent when utilizing diesel.

The system was developed by a PhilRice team composed of Arnold Juliano, Joel Ramos, Leo Moliñawe, and Dr. Eulito Bautista.

The team, led by Juliano, said running the engine-pump with rice hull will only cost farmers less than a peso to generate a cubic meter of water while using gasoline-fueled pumps costs about P2.

Juliano said a four-kilogram rice hull load could run the engine for 90 minutes at a maintaining speed of 2000 rpm and discharges an average of five liters per second water from a ground water table of 2.15 meters. 

He said field tests also showed the gasifier can run up to 100 hours with minimal problems.

The study on the development of a mobile rice hull gasifier engine-pump system won best paper during the 24th National Rice R&D Conference at the institute’s central experiment station here and during the 61st annual national convention of the Philippine Society of Agricultural Engineers in Zamboanga del Norte.

PhilRice, a government-owned and controlled corporation, is in the forefront of developing high-yielding, cost-reducing, and environment-friendly technologies as part of its mandate to ensure that farmers can produce enough rice for all Filipinos.

Juliano said the machine, which is designed to be compact, mobile and affordable, also reduces greenhouse gas emissions as rice hull is converted to power the machine.

He said wastes produced after rice hull burning within the system can be used as soil conditioner in seedbed, mulching material, and ingredient in producing organic fertilizer.

He added that the machine has been improvised to be more movable by reducing machine components to 40 percent, cutting its volume weight from 500 to 400 kilograms.

More significantly, he said its cost, with less parts, is now at only P65,000 from a high of P86,000.

“By continuously improvising the machine, we hope that more farmer cooperatives will invest not only to save, but to help reduce the contribution of burning rice hull to global warming,” he said.

Juliano advised farmers who will use the machine to clean and dry the rice hull load to produce quality gas that can run the engine with high speed and maintain good water pumping performance. Oil should also be changed after an 80-hour operation.