Status analysis of biogas plants construction associated with development of live pig industry in China

The data of live pig industry development scale in China and the corresponding construction status of biogas plants from 2007 to 2012 were analyzed in the study. With the development and adjustment of live pig industry, large-scale standardized pig farms grew very fast. In the year of 2012, the proportion of scale pig-breeding farms by which more than 500 live pigs were sold every year achieved 38.5% in the whole country, while the number of pig farms at those scales was doubled during the 5 years. The increase of scale pig-breeding provided the opportunity for biogas plant construction. Thus, there was a rapid development of biogas plant construction in the 4 dominant pig-breeding areas. By the end of 2012, the number of breeding farms' biogas plants in rural regions of China has reached 91 600, which increased by 3 times that in 2007. Especially, the biogas plant coverage of medium-scale and large-scale pig farms in coastal and southwest areas reached more than 80%. On the other hand, there were a larger number of disabled biogas plants during this period. Due to the influence of regional resources, agricultural structure, climate and technology maturity, both the biogas plant construction status associated with live pig industry development and the quality of construction and operation management were uneven. Among all the factors that affected biogas plant's usage and discarding, live pig industry adjustment and market fluctuation played an important role in the normal operation of biogas plants. For this economic development model of biogas plants in the new era, China has paid more attention to the sustainability, the developing quality, the construction pattern and the development speed of biogas plants, which are served as basic agricultural facilities and are faced with the challenge of model change and upgrade. In order to enhance biogas plant's ability of treating livestock industry pollution, we have the following suggestions: 1) improve the quality of biogas production installation and the level of operation management with the help of leading enterprise in pig industry, and encourage the enterprises to establish their own quality standard of biogas plant construction and operation management, 2) emphasize the financial support on large and super-large scale biogas plants by the government and enhance the entering requirements of enterprises involved in biogas plant construction and operation management, 3) improve the functions of balance development between farm breeding and crop planting that are associated with biogas plants, promote the development of ecological and circulatory agriculture and restrict the usage of aerobic ways for post-treatment of digested slurry in the future. ©, 2015, Chinese Society of Agricultural Engineering. All right reserved.