Cow Power in Action: 920,000 kWh of Electricity and Happier Cows
Last August, the Pennwood Farms dairy farm in Pennsylvania installed a digester to convert the manure of its 570 cows into biogas, and the new equipment is already yielding some extra benefits. Along with producing enough biogas to generate electricity at the rate of 920,000 kWh per year, the digester produces high-quality bedding that makes the cows feel more comfortable. And you know what they say about happy cows…
Renewable Energy from Biogas
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been pushing dairy farms and other livestock operations to install anaerobic digesters, which use a natural microbial process to break down raw manure. The microbes produce biogas as they chew their way through the organic material in manure. The gas can then be burned in a generator to produce electricity.
The “leftovers” from the digestion process form a benign (aka less smelly) sludge that can be dewatered and used as a natural soil enhancer in place of chemical fertilizers, or thoroughly dried and used as bedding in stalls.
In addition to producing renewable energy, digesters make for much better manure management than open lagoons, which have become notorious for causing air and water quality problems.
In turn, improved manure management can enable a livestock operation to expand without incurring additional costs for conventional manure disposal or remediation.
That also dovetails with broader public policy goals, such as preventing the contamination of drinking water supplies.
A Cow Power Showcase
Aside from helping livestock farmers to resolve environmental issues efficiently and economically, digesters can also provide farmers with a new revenue stream as illustrated by Pennwood Farms’s experience.
The digester provides all of the electricity for the farm and generates enough excess to sell back to the grid, equivalent to the typical electricity consumption of an estimated 600 people.
The farm also used to purchase sawdust bedding to the tune of $60,000 per year, but now the digester enables it to produce its own bedding on site.
Depending on the type of operation, farms with digesters could also market the dewatered digester sludge as a natural fertilizer.
Of course, a little support from the government helped to get the operation up and running: USDA provided a $264,450 Rural Energy for America Program loan and a $264,574 grant, and the Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority chipped in with $475,274 in funding for the biogas operation at Pennwood Farms.
Biogas, Milk Production, and Happy Cows
The new digester could also help contribute to higher milk production. Just a few months after the digester was installed, Duane Stoltzfus (one of four brothers who owns Pennwood) told a reporter that “the cows are happier because of the higher use of bedding… They use their stalls better and are better health-wise.”
A 2009 study from England provides some evidence to support the notion that contented cows produce milk at a significantly higher rate, though apparently the addition of some nicer bedding is just one of many possible strategies.
According to a recent report, anecdotal evidence suggests that classical music, massages, and a personal name can provide a significant boost in milk production, too.
Image: Some rights reserved by davedehetre.
Follow me on Twitter: @TinaMCasey.
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