Creating local products | Hylife refines process at Manitoba hog barn
Most phosphorus fertilizer in Manitoba now originates at mines in Florida, Morocco or other far-away spots. However, a more local form may soon be available in Manitoba, which might improve the water quality in Lake Winnipeg and boost crop yields at the same time
Over the last 15 months, Hylife, one of the largest hog and pork producers in the country, has refined a process to convert hog manure into a phosphorus rich fertilizer that can be applied to annual cropland.
In the spring of 2011, Hylife installed a waste treatment plant at a 3,000 head sow barn near its company headquarters in La Broquerie, Man.
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After months of fine-tuning the process, the plant is performing at a near optimum level, said Sheldon Stott, director of environmental affairs at Hylife.
“What we get out of the process is our solids. We get upwards of 99 percent removal of our solids. Which, in turn, we get about 99 percent of phosphorus removal from our main waste stream.”
The coarse and fine solids are mixed with straw and other carbon materials. Then, the mixture is composted to yield a stable end product, Stott said.
The objective is to sell the phosphorus rich fertilizer to growers in Manitoba’s Red River Valley, he said.
“They’re importing phosphorus… so why not import it from eastern Manitoba?”
Based on new manure management regulations in Manitoba, which take effect November 2013, application of hog effluent and other manure will be based on a crop’s phosphorus uptake. Historically, regulations have been based on nitrogen absorption but the provincial government altered the rules in response to concerns about excessive nutrients flowing into Lake Winnipeg.
In southeastern Manitoba, which has the highest concentration of swine barns in the province, the regulatory changes will force hog producers to overhaul their manure management practices because soils in the region are already saturated with phosphorus. As well, the hog barns are mostly surrounded by pasture or hay land, which can absorb a limited amount of nutrients.
To show how the shift from nitrogen to phosphorous will affect producers, Stott used an example of applying 120 pounds of nitrogen per acre to pasture land.
“For a sow barn, that would take 7,500 to 8,500 gallons (of manure) per acre. (When) we shift to the new phosphorus regulation, we’re probably in the 1,500 to 2,000 gallons per acre range,” he said. “Forages don’t permit near as much export of phosphorus off of the land base…. It’s extremely restrictive to what you can apply.”
The existing plant serves a 3,000 sow operation and can treat 27 to 29 million litres of swine manure annually. The system can be scaled up to handle more effluent and Stott expects Hylife will install three to five treatment plants at its barns in southeastern Manitoba.
By treating manure at a particular Hylife barn and exporting the phosphorus to other parts of Manitoba, it frees up the land around that barn for manure from other Hylife facilities in southeastern Manitoba, Stott said.
Besides the appeal of buying a local fertilizer product, phosphorus from hog manure is known to boost annual crop yields, said Andrew Dickson, Manitoba Pork Council general manager.
“In the U.S., using organic manures gives them, as a rule of thumb, a 10 percent yield edge in terms of crop yield,” he said. “So if you grow 200 bushels an acre in Iowa you can expect to get an extra 20 bushels if you used hog manure.”
Most Manitoba growers now buy conventional phosphorus fertilizer at their local ag dealers so it may take time for growers to latch on to the hog manure alternative, Dickson said.
So far, Hylife has transported some of its fertilizer product to cropland but it hasn’t established a full production cycle and a sizable inventory to sell.
Realistically, most will likely end up on crops in the Red River Valley and eastern Manitoba because shipping the product more than 30 kilometres probably isn’t economic, Stott said.
For Hylife and other hog producers, the Manitoba and federal governments have developed a program that helps cover the capital cost of waste treatment plants. But operating a plant requires electricity, natural gas, chemicals and labour.
“We’re looking at anywhere in the range of four to five times our current operating cost, when it comes to… manure management,” Stott said. “That translates to numbers that vary from $3.50 to $8 a pig.”
