The Yunlin County Government held the "Yunlin Smart Water Resources and Climate Adaptation Forum", inviting academic research institutions and private enterprises to discuss water supply security and sustainability strategies under climate change.
In the face of the intensification of climate change and the imbalance between water supply and demand caused by extreme weather, the Yunlin County government plans to promote the use of livestock wastewater resources and smart irrigation. This year, it has piloted the recycling of livestock wastewater and mixed farmland irrigation water for precise irrigation in Yuanchang Township and Linnei Township. The Yunlin County Environmental Protection Bureau estimates that if it is expanded to the county's livestock farms, 175 million tons of water can be saved a year, which is equivalent to the water consumption of Hsinchu Science Park in two years.
The Yunlin County Government held the "Yunlin Smart Water Resources and Climate Adaptation Forum" today (27th), inviting academic research institutions and private enterprises to discuss water supply security and sustainability strategies under climate change. The forum was hosted by Yunlin County Magistrate Zhang Lishan, Environmental Protection Bureau Director Zhang Qiaowei, Acting Director of the County Agricultural Department Cai Gengyu, and County Farmers Association Director-General Chen Zhi Yang, Lin Fuyuan, director of the Yunlin Management Department of the Farmland and Water Resources Department, Huang Yiquan, senior deputy general manager of Formosa Plastics Corporation, and Zhang Yongdian, deputy director of Qingxin Environmental Engineering, jointly signed the "Livestock Carbon Rice Sustainable Cycle Precision Irrigation MOU" to integrate livestock fertilizer, farmland irrigation, environmental monitoring and smart control technologies to improve agricultural water efficiency.
Zhang Qiaowei said that when the county government visited high-tech industries three years ago to win over industry players to set up factories in Yunlin, the industries expressed their hope to use recycled water to avoid competing with farmers for water. In addition, Xinhuwei Creek has long faced the problem of livestock wastewater pollution, so the county government promotes the recycling of wastewater. After proper treatment, it is mixed with farmland irrigation water, and the water volume and fertilizer content are precisely controlled according to crop needs, so that the original sources of pollution can be converted into agricultural resources.
Zhang Qiaowei said that the cooperation plan will also introduce smart irrigation, adjusting the amount of irrigation based on soil moisture content, field water levels and crop growth needs, allowing agricultural water use to shift from traditional empirical judgment to data management, reducing unnecessary water pumping and energy consumption.
The Environmental Protection Bureau has also proposed the concept of "water storage", which uses methods such as flood detention, rainwater storage, recycled water, agricultural return water and groundwater recharge to retain water resources in wet periods and flexibly deploy them in dry periods to reduce dependence on a single water source.
County Magistrate Zhang Lishan said that Yunlin is both a major agricultural county and a major pig-raising county. Facing the development of high-tech industries, it is necessary to take into account agricultural water use, industrial needs and environmental sustainability. Promoting the recycling of agricultural return water and livestock digestate residue and biogas slurry will be an important direction for future water resources management.
