Engineering Heritage Journal (Nov 2021)
DESIGNING, FABRICATION AND PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF AGRICULTURAL COMPOSTER FOR ECONOMICAL BIOWASTE MANAGEMENT
Abstract
In the last few years, the rapid increase of human population are creating many environmental problems because of intensification of human activities. A huge amount of wastes are generated from industries including food and agriculture industries. It is essential to protect the natural resources. It can be done with best management practices of agriculture waste in future Composting is the best method to handle the food, agricultural and industrial waste. The main objective of this research is the design and fabrication of an indigenous composter to conserve the agriculture waste. Composter structure is based on two shells. One is inner shells which is having diameter of 48 inches and outer shell having diameter of 52 inches. Between these two shells heat in the form of steam is circulated to give high temperature for pasteurization of compost. Raw material is added in the inner shell. Two gears are attached with this composter structure. One is driving gear which is also small gear attached with motor. Other one is larger gear which is adjusted according to our desire RPM requirement. Larger gear further rotates the shaft present in the inner shell of composter. Gear motor is used having the power of 3355 Watt Watt. Material used for this composter was mild steel. A boiler was attached to this composter to flow the steam in outer shell of composter. Agriculture waste considered for this research corn straw waste. The analysis have been done in a composter for compost effecting parameters. The effect of three independent parameters pressure, RPM and feeding rate was analyzed on the composting time of waste. Results indicated that increase in the RPM the time of composting also increase because of oxygen cannot consumed fully at higher RPM. Whereas the increase in feeding rate decrease the time of composting because the greater number of microbial activities generated in the composting process and compost prepared in less time. In case of pressure, higher the pressure the time of composting decreases because at higher pressure the time rise quickly and thermophilic conditions occurs quickly. At RPM 12 and feeding rate 15kg in 62.89± 2.26 time compost was prepared it was the least time as compare to others. At 10 RPM and 1 bar pressure composting time notice was 65.33±2.60. In combination of feeding rate and pressure, at feeding rate 15kg and pressure 0.5 bar least time noticed 63.00± 2.35.
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