THE BOVINE BURN

Cow poop is getting greener. Metaphorically, that is. And it is a serious matter.

Decaying cow poop turns into methane. Methane has a 25 times greater destructive impact on the atmosphere (and therefore on global climate change) than the carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels AND methane breaks down into carbon dioxide and does the same harm over the longer term.

Agriculture accounts for 35-to-40% of world methane. Methane digesters are more and more being built and used to transform agricultural waste to biogas which can be used like any other natural gas (nothing more natural) to generate electricity.

Biogas is not as clean as wind, solar, geothermal or hydrokinetic energies but it is essentially “carbon neutral” because it comes from plant sources (via cows). Biogas also substitutes for, and therefore prevents the burning of, an equivalent amount of fossil fuel.

J-U-B Engineers has developed a new kind of agricultural methane digester. Because it is less expensive, built from a hollowed out space of ground with plastics and recycled tires instead of concrete and steel, it can be installed and used at smaller ranches and farms. This will expand access to the emissions-cutting technology and significantly reduce the use of vehicle fuel and concommitant vehicle emissions from the transport of animal waste.

Building a methane digester is, nevertheless, a big undertaking for any agricultural site. A trial of the technology is beginning at Threemile Canyon Farms in Boardman, Oregon, sponsored by NW Natural, the local utility, and Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF).

Bill Eddie, spokesman, Bonneville Environmental Foundation: "It's a risky project…Every piece of the revenue stream is going to be important."

2 innovations in New Energy finance and 1 benefit of the installation make the project possible.

The innovations: (1) Half the cost goes back to the Foundation and the utility in the form of state tax credits. (2) The utility expects to sell carbon offsets to the 1% of its ratepayer base (~6,300 customers) signed up for its Smart Energy program.

The benefit: The dairy will burn the biogas produced by the methane digester, instead of buying and burning propane, to heat water used to clean milking parlors.

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Cow power: Oregon's largest dairy to test new generation of manure-to-energy technology
Jeff Barnard, December 12, 2008 (AP via Yahoo Finance)

WHO
NW Natural (Bill Edmonds, spokesman); Bonneville Environmental Foundation (Bill Eddie, spokesman); J-U-B Engineers; Threemile Canyon Farms (Marty Myers, farm manager)

WHAT
Threemile Canyon Farms will test a new generation of methane digester technology.

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WHEN
- The Threemile Canyon methane digester will go into service in March 2009.
- The state tax credits to the utility and the environmental foundation are spread over 5 years.

WHERE
- The trial of the J-U-B methane digester will be at Threemile Canyon Farms in Boardman, Oregon.
- Methane digester are in use at Tillamook, Oregon, and Salem, Oregon, diaries, at some municipal waste sites and will soon be ready at a fruit processing company near Corvallis, Oregon.
J-U-B Engineers is based in Boise, Idaho.
- Members of the Western Climate Initiative, 7 western states (including Oregon) and 4 Canadian provinces, will cut their greenhouse gas emissions 15% percent by 2020.

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WHY
- The Threemile Canyon Farms methane digester will cost $1 million.
- Methane digesters are not new but the J-U-B version cuts costs significantly.
- Having its own methane digester will eliminate the need for smaller agricultural sites to truck manure central facilities.
- The J-U-B design contours the earth and lines the manure holding basin with plastic instead of constructing it with concrete and steel.
- Old tires in the covered manure holding basin are a matrix for bacteria. The methane, the byproduct of bacterial digestion, is drawn off for use as fuel on the site or piped to a centralpower plant.
- The digester is sized to any facility’s manure handling needs and can easily be expanded.
- At ThreeMile Canyon Farms, the digester will handle the manure from 1,200 cows, ~120 pounds of manure per cow per day or ~144,000 pounds a day.
- Threemile Canyon Farms milks 16,000 cows on 93,000 acres. It will continue composting and recycling waste as fertilizer with the bulk of its manure.



QUOTES
Threemile Canyon Farms website: “At Threemile Canyon Farms, we believe that sound business practices and sound environmental practices go hand in hand.”