Chapter 373 - 178: Gradual Change

Chapter 373: Chapter 178: Gradual Change

In the Lingnan Region, for example, a three-season planting plan would typically require three applications of chemical fertilizer. Pure soybeans don’t need any fertilizer, the amount used for intercropping corn and soybeans is about the same as for planting corn alone, and intercropping wheat and soybeans increases fertilizer use by 10–20%.

The reason for these differences is to avoid wasting fertilizer. During the winter wheat season, the Lingnan climate becomes relatively dry. After fertilizing and watering, most of the phosphorus and potassium remain in the soil, and any fertilizer the wheat doesn’t use is absorbed by the soybeans.

The amount of phosphorus, potassium, and other nutrients that the winter soybeans store in their root nodules is about twice what they need for a single season.

As a result, the pure soybean crop in the following season requires no chemical fertilizer.

During the corn and soybean intercropping season, fertilizer is applied not for the soybeans, but for the corn. This is because the Immortal Soybeans have already accumulated a large portion of the easily absorbable phosphorus and potassium from the soil into their root nodules. A corn plant’s root system cannot penetrate these nodules, so an additional application of chemical fertilizer is necessary.

However, the soybeans will absorb 50% of the fertilizer applied during this intercropping season, while the nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium already stored in their root nodules remain untouched.

Under these conditions, the Immortal Soybeans planted in the Lingnan Region will accumulate a surplus of nutrients in their root nodules each year—enough phosphorus and potassium for about 1.5 seasons, and enough nitrogen for about one season.

By the winter of the third year, the soybeans are infected with a specific root rot bacterium. Once the roots completely decompose, they release the nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and organic matter they have stored for roughly three years back into the soil. This is the fundamental reason why Immortal Soybeans create nutrient-rich soil.

Land planted with Immortal Soybeans becomes more fertile over time.

After all, farmers in the country tend to use a lot of chemical fertilizer, which provides the Immortal Soybeans with an opportunity to accumulate extra nutrients.

Therefore, in a three-season planting plan like the one in the Lingnan Region, the amount of fertilizer used per unit of output actually decreases, rather than increases.

This is the benefit of improved fertilizer efficiency.

Intercropping Immortal Soybeans can boost fertilizer efficiency to around 80%—the highest rate in the world.

It’s like getting double the results from a single application of fertilizer.

Zhang Dashan and the others were unaware of these details, which is why they worried such intensive farming would leave the soil barren.

In reality, the soil’s organic matter content does decrease somewhat before the Immortal Soybean roots are made to decompose.

This is also why the technical manual recommends supplementing with organic fertilizer annually.

As for the source of the organic fertilizer...

Hailufeng Company’s dairy farm in Gongping Town, as well as the microbial fuel cell technology set to be developed next year, will provide a continuous supply of organic fertilizer to the surrounding farmland.

The cow manure, crop stalks, and agricultural waste processed by the microbial fuel cells contain 20–30% cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin, as well as large amounts of glucose, monosaccharides, vitamins, aromatic compounds, and minerals.

The battery’s effluent can be recycled as a raw material for biogas fermentation.

After returning, Jiang Miao resumed the relevant experiments.

He discovered that using the effluent from the microbial fuel cells for biogas fermentation caused production to skyrocket.

The main reason was that the effluent still contained large amounts of glucose, monosaccharides, amino acids, aromatic compounds, and minerals, in addition to residual cellulose and hemicellulose. This allowed the biogas-fermenting bacteria to save the time it would normally take to break down cellulose and hemicellulose.

Normally, one cubic meter of wet cow manure can produce about 50 cubic meters of methane.

With the effluent from the microbial fuel cells, however, one cubic meter can produce 120 cubic meters of methane—an efficiency boost of 240%.

Additionally, microbial fuel cells generate a significant amount of heat during the metabolic power generation process. If not managed promptly, this waste heat can cause the temperature in the battery chamber to skyrocket.

Therefore, this waste heat can be channeled into the biogas fermentation system via a hot water circulation system, thereby maintaining the high temperatures required for the process.

However, Jiang Miao had calculated the heat output of the microbial fuel cells. During winters south of the Yangtze River, there would be a surplus of this heat, which could be supplied to the biogas fermentation system.

In the region north of the Yangtze River and south of the Yellow River, the waste heat generated by the microbial fuel cells during winter would be just enough to sustain their own microbial activity, making them self-sufficient.

Further north of the Yellow River, however, particularly in the Northeast and the Monan Region, the heat generated by the microbial fuel cell system would be insufficient during winter, especially when outside temperatures drop below -10 degrees Celsius.

This issue can be solved with an engineering solution: building the generation chamber underground and covering it with earth for insulation.

With a one-meter-thick layer of soil and a layer of plastic sheeting, the internal temperature can be maintained at 0–5 degrees Celsius. When combined with the waste heat generated by the microbial fuel cells, the temperature inside can exceed 20 degrees Celsius.

By designing the biogas fermentation system to be placed on top of the microbial fuel cell chamber, it not only provides insulation but also reduces the energy consumption for heating. In reality, the biogas-fermenting bacteria also generate some heat themselves.

In the Huaihai Plain, a semi-underground structure would suffice, while in the Yangtze River Basin and Pearl River Basin, the microbial fuel cell and biogas fermentation systems could be built entirely above ground.

Especially during summers in the Yangtze and Pearl River Basins, the high ambient temperatures would leave no way to dissipate the waste heat from the microbial fuel cells.

This would require utilizing that waste heat by appropriately scaling up the biogas fermentation system.

In short, the slurry and residue—the final byproducts of the microbial fuel cell and biogas fermentation systems—can be used as a highly effective organic fertilizer in the future, and the production volume will be immense.

After all, with all the dairy cows raised by Hero Dairy and the vast amount of agricultural waste available, there is an overabundance of raw materials for organic fertilizer.

Once the entire system is up and running, it may even be possible to gradually reduce the use of chemical fertilizers, thereby lowering production costs.

For any business, production costs and efficiency determine its foundation.

Hailufeng Company is, in essence, a high-tech enterprise, not a traditional agricultural company.