In march 28 2018, in the Kostyantynivka village in Melitopol district of Zaporizhia region, a demonstration project on the energy use of wood from gardens pruning was implemented on the Black Sea fruit company Ltd. gardens. The event was organized by SEC Biomass – UABio member together with Association “Ukrainian Agribusiness Club” within the framework of the project “uP_running – sustainable supply of woody biomass from agrarian pruning and plantation removal” funded by the European Union Research and Innovation Program Horizon 2020.
Measurements showed that in high-tech apple gardens with a density of planting of 3000 trees/ha annually is cut from 2,2 to 3,3 t/ha of wood with a humidity of about 48%. In the Black Sea fruit company, as well as in other horticultural enterprises, wood from the gardens pruning pushes out with a tractor from the rows of the garden, forming large heaps. But, unlike the common national gardening practice of burning such batches, General Director of the Black Sea fruit company – Vasiliy Mikulin initiated the creation of a value chain on gardens pruning processing into wood chips, which is used as solid biofuel in boilers or as mulch for trees. To do this he purchased the necessary equipment, in particular, a modern wood chipper, a spacious trailer and a solid fuel boiler with automatic fuel feed, which will be installed this year. Wet wood chips are transported to special storage facilities, where it is dried and stored until the heating period. In general, taking into account the losses of biomass during the technological operations of the value chain approximately 1.2 tons of wood chips with a 25% humidity is obtained from one hectare of the garden, which is equivalent to a net calorific value of about 450 cubic meters of natural gas.
The replacement of natural gas with the wood chips from gardens pruning used for heating of the administrative building enterprise has confirmed the economic attractiveness of this activity, even when using a solid boiler with manual loading. Subsequently, Vasiliy plans to increase the wood chips production, install several more modern solid fuel boilers with automatic fuel supply and hopes that his bioenergy initiatives will be supported by the local community. The existing value chain productivity will be able to feet the energy needs of both households and social facilities in Konstantinovka village, in particular in three schools. This will create new jobs and will increase economy of the local budget.