HAIRY HILL, Alta. Ñ An Alberta company may be able to calm the controversy about the volume and smell of manure produced by feedlots.
While similar technology that turns manure into energy has been used for years in Europe, none of the existing systems uses dry manure from feedlots to produce energy.
“We have developed Canadian technology for a Canadian problem,” said Mike Kotelko of Highmark Renewables near Vegreville, Alta., during the company’s official opening of the $7.9 million plant on May 6.
The Integrated Manure Utilization System, co-developed by the Alberta Research Council, uses manure from the nearby Highland Feeders’ 36,000 head feedlot to produce power, heat, water and fertilizer.
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Kotelko, the project manager of the IMUS plant and co-owner of Highland Feeders, said he and his brother, Bern, first discussed the idea of turning manure into energy five years ago.
“We recognized the real and perceived issues around manure management and confinement operations,” said Kotelko.
He joined with four other southern Alberta feedlot operators, Cor Van Raay, Glen Thompson, Larry Nolan and Rick Paskal, to look into the feasibility of the project.
“The technology is at a very early stage. Someone has to go through the process of developing the systems and prove the viability of it,” said Kotelko, who took on the task of building the pilot plant while the others helped fund it.
For two years Kotelko worked with Alberta Research Council scientists to develop a small laboratory plant before starting construction of the full scale plant in May 2004.
At one point BSE almost derailed the project. When the American border was closed to live Canadian cattle two years ago, large feedlot operators lost millions of dollars when the price of cattle plummeted.
“We had to reevaluate whether we were able to carry on with the project,” Kotelko said.
The IMUS plant uses the manure from 7,500 cattle, or about 100 tonnes, each day. The manure is converted into a slurry and then pumped into one of the two methane digesters. The slurry is circulated using a series of jet nozzles. During this process methane gas is produced, which is used to make electricity in a cogeneration plant. The plant produces a little less than one megawatt of power, the upper limit of energy that provincial government regulations allow small scale operations to produce.
The feedlot and the power plant use 30 to 40 percent of the power that the plant produces. The feedlot buys the power from Highmark Renewables.
“It’s not like the feedlot is getting free power. It’s part of creating economic viability for the biogas plant,” Kotelko said.
Van Raay, one of the largest feedlot operators in Canada, said it would be a while before similar plants are part of every feedlot operation.
“This is not the answer to all our problems, but it’s a start,” said Van Raay.
Thompson said it all comes down to cost. The technology will be used when it’s affordable for feedlots.
“Like everything it has to come to the ability to build it and pay for it along with building a feedlot. The cost of building it has to make some economic sense,” said Thompson.
Climate Change Central became a partner in the project because it saw the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, said company vice-president Paul Hunt.
“Significant emissions are produced from the agriculture sector,” said Hunt.
“This takes what is formally a waste and through various processes converts it to methane, which is a fuel for generating electricity and heat,” said Hunt.
One quarter of the manure from the feedlot could supply one quarter of the equivalent electricity needs of the nearby town of Vegreville.
“If the manure from this feedlot alone, 40,000 head, was processed in similar fashion, you could produce the entire power needs of the town of Vegreville, about 6,000 people.
“You multiply that with the hog and beef cattle operation, that’s a sizable renewable energy contribution,” Hunt said.
Carlos Monreal, a research scientist with Agriculture Canada, said the project is an important development for agriculture.
“One of the main reasons we got involved with this is to try to improve the environmental performance of agriculture,” said Monreal.
“It’s a way of advancing the economic and environmental performance of agriculture,” said Monreal, who is working with six similar projects across Canada that use aerobic digestion to turn manure into energy.
Alan Hall with the Alberta Agricultural Research Institute said one of the major impediments to livestock growth in Alberta is the waste and odour issues of manure.
“This is a technology that offers a solution to that.”
