Danes window to all…
Danes window to all…
This week it was Denmarks
turn to present its
agricultural wares to the
world. Agromek, held at
Herning, tempted some
80,000 visitors through its
doors to see all that is new
on the Danish front.
Andy Collings reports
MORE than two-thirds of Denmarks farm production is exported – in 1996 this generated some 48bn kroner (£4.2bn) – such is the importance of the countrys agricultural industry.
Statisticians will also need to know that Denmark has just under 70,000 farms, employing 13,000 people full-time, with the average farm size being 41ha (102 acres).
On the machinery front, Denmark boasts several major manufacturers and numerous others supplying kit for the home market. And it is the Agromek event which provides the shop window for their respective developments.
A sensitive country when it comes to matters of the environment, Denmark has always supported the use of natural resources – wind power, for example.
But Agromek saw the start of a new initiative – the better utilisation of pig manure. Introduced by Danish company Bioscan, it aims to turn liquid manure into clean water, ammonia concentrate, P and K concentrate and biogas used to generate electricity.
The system involves the following processes: Liquid pig manure is first filtered to separate out particles over 1mm in size. The resulting liquid is passed through a biogas reactor before being stripped of its ammonia content. A "reversed osmosis" operation then separates out the remaining fertiliser content to leave clean water.
Meanwhile, the gas produced is purified to take out the hydrogen sulphide, and then either used to create power or heat.
Bioscan has now set up its first processing plant on a Danish pig farm producing 15,000 porkers from 1100 sows, with a further 10,000 sold as piglets.
This pig volume manages to produce 40cu m of liquid manure which, after being processed yields 30cu m of clean water, 1cu m of ammonia concentrate, 5cu m of P and K concentrate and 1cu m of fibre compost.
Interest in the system is riding high in Denmark with 10 test sites due to be installed this year .\
to provide further test data for the company.