At the farming enterprise «FGM-2017» they made a fundamental decision: to abandon diesel and switch to a pellet heat generator from the Ukrainian company AgroWarm (Okhtyrka). The reason is simple — arithmetic and safety.

«We took two KAMAZ trucks to the elevator — they issued a bill for 80 thousand. Diesel also didn’t add up: fuel price jumped, corn price fell — we ended up in the red», they recall at the farm.
After comparing expenses, the farmers saw the difference: «With pellets, 1 ton-percent costs about 10-12 UAH, while on diesel — around 100 UAH. Previously, drying took up to 400 liters of diesel; now it’s about one ton of pellets per 30-ton batch».

Safety became decisive. «Other systems used open flame — corn caught fire, the fire brigade came. Here, hot air is mixed and enters the grain without flame, spark arresters work. If the power goes out — emergency shutdown activates, the hatch opens, the pellet spills out, everything stops automatically».

Control is extremely simple: «Three buttons. Set the temperature — and that’s it. Automation maintains the mode and switches to cooling. In three years we haven’t changed anything major».
Fuel consumption remains stable: «2-3 kg of pellets per 1% moisture per ton. The bunker lasts for a day. Ash amounts to one bucket in three days. No smoke, grain quality is accepted without remarks — both for ports and for export».

The conclusion for the enterprise is payback and process control: «After installing the boiler, we finally had money left. It’s like switching from a Zhiguli to a Mercedes: everything is automatic, it feeds itself, maintains the temperature. You must have your own dryer — otherwise you can’t manage».