[Stoves] Energy content cow dung

Tue Feb 12 19:07:16 CST 2013

Hi Ron,

The university of Adelaide students had their project on the TLUD to burn dung effectively and efficiently. This project was a part of the EWB undergraduate project work. I happened to be the on-ground personel developing and researching the burning of cow dung. The TLUD stove developed by the students was an attractive option and I was the ground support for them. However, one of the failures of that very design was bulk feeding whereas more of continuous feeding was preferred in Nepal. However, we are looking to utilize the TLUD technology for a double burner continuous feeding stove. 

Regarding the utilisation of dung solely as a fertilizer rather than burning it is a very debatable topic. Washing of dung is the perfect solution to end this debate. However, no chemical analysis of the liquid portion of the washed dung has been conducted yet. Hence, briquetting the solid portion of the washed dung yielded great results. 

Still working at the stove.

Cheers

Sarbagya

Sent from my iPhone

On 12/02/2013, at 4:17 PM, rongretlarson at comcast.net wrote:

> List, Richard, etal
> 
>    I started this note off thinking I would try to prove that dung should not be used for cooking at all.  In googling,  I found nothing (repeat nothing) good to be said about using dung for cooking - except that it was sometimes necessary because there was nothing else.    The alternative of course is the tremendous value of dung to improve soils.    My guess is that almost everywhere, that something can/should be planted for long term alternative fuel supply not using dung.  We have had recent discussion of Jatropha seeds for instance.
> 
>    But after looking at a lot of web material, an Australian site popped up for improved cooking using a TLUD with dung.  Many years ago I tried using dung in Ethiopia with a TLUD and had zero success - so I was impressed.  The site is 
>        https://www.engineeringforchange.org/news/2011/10/09/cooking_in_adelaide_with_experimental_dung_burning_stoves.html
> 
>   It probably is necessary to only view what they call Blog #4, but there are three earlier - some showing the conversion of the dung into a fuel shape.   I could not tell from blog #4 what their eventual fuel shape was, but maybe "cubes" of 4-5 cm size,  if their starter material was typical.  I doubt that it was in the form of "patties"   I liked all I could tell about their TLUD, but think it could perhaps be improved with primary air control.
> 
>    The saved char certainly has more value for soil improvement than the ash, if ash from typical non-TLUD stoves is ever saved/used.  But it is not clear to me that their input dung wouldn't have been better used for composting with wood char being used (from the beginning - not added) with the raw dung. Not sure but there seemed to be enough efficiency improvement with the TLUD over the three stone, that they need not use more dung - and can still retain a good bit of the dung's soil-nutritional value.  In this note I am trying to emphasize using dung to replace fertilizer - a topic I know little about, except I couldn't find a single place where dung use is recommended for cooking.
> 
>   Contacting these clever Australian students would probably lead now to even more information on the dung-stove-soil nutrition topic.  
> 
> Ron
> 
> From: "Richard Stanley" <rstanley at legacyfound.org>
> To: "Discussion of biomass cooking stoves" <stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org>
> Cc: "Kaji Sanu" <fost at ntc.net.np>, "Kavita Mary and Francis" <fmkavita at yahoo.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 2:37:52 PM
> Subject: Re: [Stoves] Energy content cow dung
> 
> Dear Sarabagya,
> 
> I have ccy'd your request to our good friends, and briquette trainers' researchers, Mary and Francis Kavita who are based in Kenya. They have trained Masaai in making nice smelling, clean burring dung blend fuel briquettes ot in Masaailand a couple of years ago. ( They have also developed similar blends for elephant dung blends in same and neighboring regions in Kenya.  
> 
> I also ccy it to Sanu Kaji of the Foundation for Sustainable Technologies (FoST) in Thamel /Kathmandu as he is the resident expert in briquette making there in you country (…and probably regionally as well).  Finally wanted to touch base also  with Mzee Bob out there in Northern  Masaailand,  it may also be useful to you as well in that you are looking at dung burning now. As a replacement for wood (which was probably far more obtainable when you began your work there), it made little sense to go to the trouble to making briquettes-- but now ??
> 
> I'd trust Mary and Francis skills implicitly: We trained then in 2001 and they have been all over the nation and region in fact,  training others on their own steam under their own business since that time.  We had some camel dung blends they made, tested at the Kenya Industrial Research& Development Institute (KIRDI) for a potential project up in Somaliland a couple of years ago.  
> 
> All the best (ukinaweza saida huyu jamaa,  Francis, ilikua  mzuri , asante sana)
> 
> Richard Stanley(mzee pia)
> www.legacyfound.org 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> This may or may not be useful to you buOn Feb 11, 2013, at 6:49 AM, Sarbagya Tuladhar wrote:
> 
> Hi Bob,
> 
> Really interesting on the work regarding the Maasai stove for cow dung. Can you provide me more information on the stove ? Dung burning for fuel is a major problem here in South Nepal and we are exploring on ways to combat them.
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Sarbagya Tuladhar
> Nepal
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On 11/02/2013, at 12:13 AM, rbtvl at aol.com wrote:
> 
> > Some of the Maasai burn cow dung in their three stone fires and now burn it in our stove and report it is okay and they use less just like the wood burning folks.  I want to do some analysis and need a reasonable estimate of energy per mass of some average dung.  Googling I got about 75% of the energy density in hard wood fuel. Please send me info or sources on this. Don't need to bore the whole list so use my email.  Thanks 
> > Bob.  Maasai Stoves and Solar. 
> > Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone provided by Airtel Tanzania.
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