Animal waste: An alternative fuel

Three farming communities in Southern Leyte were relieved somehow from using expensive fuel in cooking.

This after the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) introduced to the residents of three remote villages in the City of Maasin and the towns of Hinunangan and Tomas Opus the Community-managed Potable Water and Sanitation Hygiene (CPWASH) project, a new approach in delivering water, energy, health and sanitation in the countyside by using available resources in the community.

CPWASH has four sub-projects – the rain water collector, the bio-sand filters, the iron removable filters and the bio-gas digester.

Under the last sub-project, no one in these villages ever thought that the wastes of their pigs can be transformed into an alternative fuel.  

Virginia Dueñas, one of the recipients of the said project in Barangay Hantag, Maasin City, disclosed that they no longer use firewood or LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) in cooking after this project was introduced to them by DAR. According to her, they can now save around ₱700 a month for they no longer buy LPG.

Their income likewise has increased as they are forced to raise more pigs in order to gather sufficient organic wastes that would be turned into fuel.

CPWASH project coordinator Julius Monge explained that animal wastes are fed and collected in the bio-gas digester that in turn, produce methane gas through anaerobic digestion.

         Further, under the CPWASH project rural folks were also trained how to construct bio-sand filters and iron removable filters to make water from deep wells potable. (PR)