The entire world is actively making plans of going into renewable sources of energy as a way to recover better from the pandemic. This action also greatly benefits global climate, and among the many varieties to pick from, there may be a part of renewables that the African continent has not paid much attention. How about the idea of using agriculture for energy?
The continent of Africa is known to be greatly blessed with farmlands and a variety of food crops. Amongst the many types of renewable energy sources is the not so common biomass energy. Being that countries are trying to find the sustainable resource they are most abundant in to use as a source of energy, countries of Africa can employ biomass as an energy source.
Biomass as a source of renewable energy is basically the use of elements from plants and animals to create energy. Some of these elements include crops such as maize and soybeans, animal waste, wood wastes such as sawdust and wood chips. Hence, the mere practice of agriculture of any kind can be channeled into sustainable energy.
In the US, it is recorded that in 2019, about 5% of energy was gotten from biomass.
The agricultural products, however, have to go through a variety of processes to produce energy. These processes of conversion include chemical conversion, biological conversion, thermochemical conversion and direct combustion. All of these processes produce liquid fuels, liquid and gaseous fuels, solid, liquid and gaseous fuels, and heat respectively.
With most farmers in Africa getting rid of farm wastes such as unsold crops and animal dung, the use of biomass as a source of energy opens doors to way we can use agriculture for energy. Ways that would mean more can be gotten from the agricultural sector for energizing homes, and ways to promote waste being re-useable.