Manure Manager

Features Anaerobic Digestion Applications Business/Policy Dairy Energy Energy Production Environment Sustainability United States
WI dairy farm installing small-scale digester


December 13, 2012  by Press release

December 13, 2012, Oshkosh, WI— One of Wisconsin’s thousands of small farms just moved one step closer to becoming one of its most innovative, green-energy pioneers.

The Titan 55 was lowered into its new home at Allen Farms, northwest of Oshkosh, WI, in the early hours of Nov. 2. It took more than one month for the small-scale, plug-and-play containerized digester to travel from a manufacturing plant in Poland by ship, and across America’s heartlands before reaching Oshkosh, WI.

The Titan 55 is BIOFerm Energy Systems’ smallest anaerobic digester and is specifically designed for operations with a limited organic waste stream, making it ideal for farms the size of Dave Allen’s. The biodigester will process manure produced by the farm’s 135 dairy cows to make biogas. Part of Titan 55’s appeal is its smaller, more manageable size. It was designed with farmers specifically in mind, to help them process waste like manure, bedding and spoiled silage, while adding value to the farm.

University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh is proud to have, in partnership with BIOFerm, found a way to extend environmentally friendly agricultural practices and sustainable energy production to the small farms that have defined Wisconsin for generations,” said UW Oshkosh chancellor Richard Wells. “We are also proud of the opportunity this project creates for our environmental studies students and faculty to use a small-farm’s energy production pilot project as an incredible high-impact, hands-on learning opportunity.”

Advertisement

“With UW Oshkosh faculty and students serving as field advisors and researchers to assist Allen Farms, the Titan 55 project will demonstrate how smaller farming operations can reduce operational energy costs through smaller digester units that could be manufactured in the New North,” said UW Oshkosh vice chancellor for administrative services Tom Sonnleitner. “There may be tremendous potential for job growth in the state.”

Titan 55 is the second biodigester to come from BIOFerm’s partnership with the University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh (UWO) and the UW Oshkosh Foundation. The first was a dry fermentation digester UWO built in 2011, which supplies the campus with 10 percent of its electricity needs in part by processing its cafeteria food waste.

“We’ve been very privileged in our partnership with the university,” said BIOFerm president and CEO Nadeem Afghan. “Their dedication to the creation of renewable energy has been the driving force behind both these biodigesters. BIOFerm’s Titan 55 is just the first of many projects of its kind, and opens a realm of possibility for biogas production on small dairy farms that was previously lacking.”

The small-scale biodigester is projected to be fully operational early 2013 after which point it will be available for public viewing.

Advertisement

Stories continue below