“Green Gears” Eco-friendly Products: a Sustainable Idea to Stubble Burning
Agro-Residue Pollution in India:
Air pollution is highest in northern states of India from September to December months every year. Agro-Residue burning by Farmers is one of the reason for this pollution. Farmers from Punjab, Chandigarh and Haryana burning agro-residues in their fields after the crop harvesting.
If we look into the causes of this stubble burning: This problem arises mainly due to the use of mechanised harvesting which leaves several inches of stubble in the fields and removal of this stubble is necessary for growing next crop. So, burning these agro-residues with a single lighted match sick is easy for the farmers. Moreover Rice/wheat straw is considered useless as fodder in the case of non-basmati rice, because of its high silica content.
Open stubble/agro-residue burning emits large amounts of toxic pollutants in the atmosphere which contain harmful gases like methane (CH4), Carbon Monoxide (CO), Volatile organic compound (VOC) and carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. After the release of these gases in the atmosphere, these pollutants disperse in the surroundings, may undergo a physical and chemical transformation and eventually adversely affect human health by causing a thick blanket of smog. Burning rice husk on ground destroys the nutrients in the soil, making it less fertile. Heat also generated by straw burning and penetrates into the soil, leading to the loss of moisture and farmers friendly microbes.
We can stop this activity through income generation to farmers from these agro-waste. When income source is generated to farmers from these agro-residues, then no burn and no pollution.
Festival Pollution in India:
In India Ganesh Chaturthi is a holy festival celebrated all over the India. Ganesha Idols are erected in each and every home, street every year and worshiped as part of the festival. After Nine days puja, these Idols are immersed in the nearest waterbodies (river/pond/sea). However, most of these statues are made of Plaster of Paris (PoP). Immersion of these PoP statues in water bodies will cause harm to the hydro ecosystem and imbalances environment. This needs to replace PoP Idols with Eco-friendly idols.
Single Use Plastic Pollution:
The plastic demon devours the world. The accumulation of plastic objects and particles in the Earth's environment that adversely affects wildlife, wildlife habitat, and humans. Single use plastics products like cups, plates, thermocoal etc.. are breaking into smaller and smaller becomes micro plastics (less than 5 mm in length). These micro-plastics damage aquatic creatures, as well as turtles and birds: They block digestive tracts, diminish the urge to eat, and alter feeding behavior, all of which reduce growth and reproductive output. Their stomachs stuffed with plastic, some species starve and die. Our Prime Minister Narendra Modi called every Indian to reduce and stop the usage of single use plastic items from 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi and gave the opportunity for new innovations to replace these.
Sustainable solution from “Green Gears Team”
“Green Gears” with caption Gearingup for green was a club started by Mr. Singuru Rajesh, Assistant Prof, Raghu Engineering College, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India. Vission of Green Gears is to provide sustainable solutions to various social related issues with science and technology.
We ("Green Gears") have found a sustainable solution to these 3 problems. We transformed these agro-residues into new green products that can replace PoP and Single usage Products. Our Solution provide an alternate to Agro-Residue Birning, Plastoc Pollution, Festival Pollution, Air Pollution and Single use Plastic Pollution.
Green Gears Ganesh an Eco-friendly Ganesh Idol. Our Team transformed this agro-residues into idols. After Puja these idols can be immersed anywhere land or water. Immersing them in the water bodies such as rivers/ponds/sea, these does not cause any harm to the environment. In addition, they generate home to aquatic organisms such as molasses and algae. Fishes and Turtles eat those. We kept some herbal seeds in this agro-residue Ganesh idol. So after burying the idols in the soil or in a pot plant, they becomes fertilizer within two weeks and the seed turns into a plant. Apart from the Ganesh idol, Agro-residue can also be used to make biodegradable rakshabandhans, plates, cups, insulator panels, eco panels, card boards, papers and package materials against plastic products. In this way we transformed Scrap to Sustainable.
Our innovation also received the Nav Bharat Nirman Award 2019 from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India at India International Science Festival on 7th November, 2019. Father of Indian Green Revolution Prof. M.S. Swaminathan also appreciated our work with an E-mail.
We are planning to start a cooperative society unit in collaboration with farmers of North-East Districts of Andhra State to produce products with Agro-residues. We are planning to sell these products under Atma Nirbhar Bharat all over India. In this COVID-19 pandemic situation we distributed our Ganesh Idols in Visakhapatnam City for Ganesh festival. After recovery from Covid we are planning to make different idols also too..
As we are the students group and I am a faculty in an Institution we are looking for fund for us it make it bigger. Environment and farmers supportive NGOs and members can join with us towards Farmer-The Back Bone of India support.
Visit our Instagram page for more : https://instagram.com/environment_shraddha?igshid=c5fq9fgt30al
Contact us : rajeshsinguru@gmail.com Phone No & WhatsApp No: 9493724967
Green Gears Works for those, who work in acres.
Author for this Article
Singuru Rajesh
M.Tech (Machine Design), PGDEEM, B.Tech (Mechanical Engineering)
Head, Green Gears
Assistant Professor
Raghu Engineering College
Visakhapatnam, India
Email: rajeshsinguru@gmail.com