Ivan Chunikhin, a farmer from the village of Kolomyichikha, Svatovsky District, Luhansk Region, has recently started making straw briquettes. The entrepreneur received the equipment for this with a grant from the USAID project "Economic Support to Eastern Ukraine", according to the project's Facebook page.

A USAID project purchased a straw baler, a briquetting machine and a straw chopper. The farmer recruited four people working on this equipment.

It is noted that the farmer has his own raw material for the production of briquettes - straw - because he grows sunflower, corn and other industrial crops. This year I have harvested about 100 tons of straw.

“After harvesting, straw remains in the field, and a tractor with a baler drives in and forms large bales of it. We bring them to the workshop, feed them to the shredder, and then to the briquetting machine, which forms small briquettes from straw under pressure and high temperature. They are already ready for heating homes or offices, we do not add any additives, this is an environmentally friendly product,” says Ivan Chunikhin, head of the Rozivske farm.

According to the entrepreneur, the energy value of the straw is high. 1.5 tons of straw briquettes replace 1 ton of coal. The cost of briquettes is 3000 hryvnia per ton, coal - from 6500 to 9000 hryvnia.

This use of straw is an alternative to smoking it. After all, burning after harvesting harms the soil, destroying the top fertile layer, and also poses a threat of fires. Also, many farmers plow the remains of the straw that remains in the fields.

“Many farmers burn straw, I am against that. We destroy soil, beneficial bacteria and organisms. Also, we all need to think about the fact that heating with wood is the destruction of forests, which are not enough here in the East of Ukraine. Straw is a great natural heating material, but people don't know much about it. I popularize straw briquettes - I tell my fellow villagers, I give potential clients samples of briquettes so that people can try and be convinced of the quality of my product, ”says the farmer.

Ivan also hopes that in the future people will use more alternative energy sources to heat their homes and offices. Now Ivan Chunikhin sells briquettes to residents of the Kolomyichitsa society, and is also negotiating to use them for heating a village club, library, school, kindergarten. These establishments have boilers that allow heating the premises with both gas and alternative fuels.

SEEDS