What are the economics of dairy farm anaerobic digesters?

[wuushew]

I was watching a local PBS show last night and it featured a farmer who was generating 300 kilowatts off an anaerobic digester he built in 2004 for a million dollars.

From a capital investment standpoint isn't this in the same class of outlay as a dairy parlor?


Two questions

(1)What interest rates do banks charge farmers for farm improvement loans?

(2)At what rate do electric companies typically buy back excess power?


In my opinion this technology is a guaranteed money maker in addition to being a green source of electricity. What economic factors prevent every dairy farmer in America from building them?

[Porcupine]

1. A local dairy has been doing this for 20 years. Link.

http://www.epa.gov/agstar/resources/lag_cons.html

http://www.wurdco.com/News%20Clips/pgeversuscowpower.htm

Here's a digestere operation at a brewery:http://www.newsreview.com/chico/Content?oid=oid%3A259999

[htuttle]

2. UW Madison/MREC has extensive information on them

http://www.mrec.org/anaerobicdigestion.html

http://www.mrec.org/anaerobic_digestion_text.html

[kestrel91316]

3. I don't know or care what it costs in dollars. Every large dairy in

the WORLD ought to be doing this because it's the RIGHT THING TO DO.

Rather than subsidizing fossil-fuel based environmental rape, we need to be subsidizing this sort of project.