The Environmental Protection Administration promotes the "big pig with little pigs" model to help livestock farms generate biogas power, with subsidies of up to 50 million
After the Council of Agriculture began subsidizing livestock farms with a rearing scale of more than two thousand head for using biogas power generation, the Environmental Protection Administration today announced it will step up its "big pigs lead small pigs" policy. That is, if in the future large ranches can expand their installation of "anaerobic fermentation and biogas power generation" equipment and assist small livestock farms in handling pig or cattle manure and urine, reaching a resource utilization rate of more than 75%, operators can receive up to fifty million yuan in subsidies. The EPA promises to cover up to seventy percent of the cost, with the remainder absorbed by local governments.
Small pig farms account for ninety percent
According to EPA statistics, livestock farms across Taiwan with a rearing scale of more than five thousand head number 129 in total, raising 1.27 million head; medium-sized farms of two thousand to five thousand head number 342, raising 1 million head; and small farms of fewer than two thousand head number 7,138, raising 3.15 million head, with small farms alone accounting for more than ninety percent.
That is why the EPA is promoting the "big pigs lead small pigs" policy. Liu Jui-hsiang, deputy director of the Water Quality Protection Division, explained that the Council of Agriculture recently announced the "Directions for Rewards and Subsidies for Biogas Power Generation at Pig Farms," which provides subsidies for pig farms of more than 2000 head to install raised-bed facilities, rainwater and wastewater separation, and biogas power generation-related facilities, and further offers a biogas power generation reward. But because small farms find it harder to bear the enormous equipment costs, in order to bring the small livestock farms that account for 93.8% of all Taiwan farms into the ranks of resource utilization, the EPA is subsidizing large farms to assist in handling the manure and urine of small farms, thereby raising operators' willingness to do biogas power generation.
The more assistance, the more subsidy, up to 50 million
On the subsidy amount, Liu Jui-hsiang pointed out that for every 200 pigs or 50 cattle whose manure and urine a large livestock farm helps a small farm handle, the EPA will subsidize 1 million yuan to local livestock operators and related technology vendors, and "the more assistance, the more subsidy." The maximum planned subsidy amount will reach NT$50 million, of which the EPA will pay up to NT$35 million, with the remainder subsidized according to the differing financial tiers of each county and city government. The subsidy funds can be used to purchase tanker trucks, build transport pipelines, and set up storage and collection tanks between livestock farms.
Liu Jui-hsiang also stressed that within two years the EPA expects to invest 200 million yuan to handle the subsidies, and is expected to collect and process 40,000 head of pig manure and urine, generating 2 million kWh of electricity per year, reducing 40,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, and 1.1 million kilograms of organic pollution. In the future it will also evaluate the effectiveness of implementation and then allocate budget to expand the program.
The EPA also pointed out that there are many ways to utilize livestock manure and urine as resources. Besides biogas power generation, biogas residue and biogas slurry can be used as fertilizer for farmland. Reusing livestock manure and urine in accordance with the law, or treating it to meet effluent standards, and using it as irrigation water is also one approach. As long as manure and urine are reused as resources, one can apply to be exempted from paying water pollution fees.