Vt. Dairy Farmers Use Manure for Energy

Associated Press ^ | June 30, 2006 | DAVID GRAM

[Uncledave]

Renewable Energy Ping

Please Freep Mail me if you'd like on/off

[Calpernia]

Big bump to Vermont!


http://www.breederville.com/auction/forumtopic-67-1.html
Vt. Dairy Farm Harnesses Power of Cow Pies

http://www.breederville.com/auction/forumtopic-73-1.html
Farm Premises ID & NAIS Dead in VT

[Calpernia]

bttt

[Pete from Shawnee Mission]

My guess is that you can use the heat from the methane digester to heat a barn, a house, greenhouse, or something like that. You can use the product, the night soil for fertilizer, or, compress it and burn it (not sure about this) and extract more heat.

My father had a cold frame that he would use to start seedlings. In early March he would dig a pit about 2 feet deep, dump in a foot of manure cover it with a foot of topsoil and plant. The heat from the composting manure would provide heat for the seedlings on cold nights.

When horses were still a primary form of transportation, there were some french farms that would grow through the winter. They would collect the manure in rows, cover with topsoil, and plant their crop, usually lettuce or radishes, some crop that didn't take 120 days to grow. Bell jars covered the crop, and at night they rolled out a canvas covering to retain the heat. You could only do this for specialty crops, but it was still fresh produce in the winter.

Again, these are curiosities. But you use what you have, and what your circumstances dictate. I doubt that we will go back to manure as direct heat source anytime soon, but we may be able to use it to create methane, which is a bit more transportable and acceptable heat source.

[decimon]

From the second link:

"The VT AoA is one 800 lb guerilla that just learned it can't sit anywhere it pleases."

If there's an 800 pound guer(r)illa and an 800 pound gorilla, which gets the seat?

[Calpernia]

If something is 800lbs, I would opt to get out of it's way and let it sit.

[ClaireSolt]

Since I was a kid, Milwaukee solid waste has been marketed as fertilizer under the label Milorganite.