Influence of anhydrous ammonia on drying of forage grain

Abstract

Grain drying by active ventilation remains the main grain preservation method use in agriculture. The price of grain, dried by active ventilation, goes up due to the electrical energy, consumption, necessary for rotation of fans and heating of the fed air. To reduce energy consumption, shorten the drying time and prepare high quality forage is the task, solution to which is searched for, including the development of new forage grain drying and preservation technologies. In many countries chemical preservation is used for forage grain storage. Investigations of various chemical compounds and their use for wet grain preservation are carried out. Various chemical substances can be used for this purpose, such as anhydrous ammonia, propionic acid, formaline and carbon dioxide. Anhydrous ammonia is an inexpensive preservative. Its preservative properties are based on fungicidal, bactericidal and bacteriostatic effect. Anhydrous ammonia destroys microflora, which propagaties in the grain layer, and hinders the development of mould. It was also determined, that when plant produce is treated with ammonia, water-holding power in their cells declines, therefore moisture is easily evaporated or is remowed mechanically. Ammonia contains 83% nitrogen; therefore ammonia treatment improves forage quality by increasing the protein content.A great adventage of active ventilation drying method, involving the use of anhydrous ammonia gas, is that it is easy to introduce this gas in the dried material, where it is evently distributed. Using chemical substances it is possible to reduce the forage price, as production of the chemical substances used requires less energy than is needed to evaporate the same amount of water from grain by blowing air.