The contributions of U.S. dairy farmers to reducing food waste and generating renewable energy are featured in National Geographic’s special “Food of the Future” series.
Digesters create renewable energy, better manage manure, produce a steady supply bedding, and lessen their dairy’s environmental footprint by reducing air emissions and odor.
Water deliveries to farmers in California's San Joaquin Valley are on the rise this year. Both the state Department of Water Resources (DWR) and the federal U.S. Bureau of Reclamation yesterday announced they would increase 2010 water allocations to 40% for water contractors south of the Delta.
One trip to look at an anaerobic digester on a dairy in central Minnesota was all it took to convince Lee Jensen that the technology would be a good fit for his 900-cow Five Star Dairy near Elk Mound, Wis.
In 2007, Cargill's Environmental Finance Group began building a plug-flow digester on Bettencourt Farms' new Dry Creek Dairy, a 10,000-cow operation near Murtaugh, Idaho. Since going online in September 2008, the 5-million-gallon digester has generated electricity for the Idaho grid, reduced manure odor, cut manure handling costs and produced digester solids for the dairy's bedding.
Dairy Today has covered numerous U.S. dairy digester and cap-and-trade projects in recent years. These producers tell what they've learned since we first featured them.
