Energy Efficient Dairy Farming in Minnesota

Nick and Tara Meyer have been working with the NRCS and SWCD on improving the energy efficiency of their dairy farm for many years. They milk 280 Holstein cattle twice each day, and they grow corn, alfalfa, and soybeans on the 800-acre farm in Stearns County, Minnesota. They have worked with the NRCS on manure storage pits, stacking slab, sediment control basins, grass waterways, and several energy efficiency projects, including the installation of LED lighting, and a ventilation system with variable frequency fans. They also have improved the energy efficiency of their floor warming, milk transporting, and milk cooling systems. Their latest project is a grain drying system. In this video Nick Meyer discusses these projects with Mike Hemmann, Civil Engineer, NRCS, Mark Lefebrve, Conservation Planning Team Manager, SWCD, and Natalie Wilwerding, Soil Conservationist, NRCS. Videography by Dan Balluff.
For more information please visit the Minnesota NRCS website at: www.nrcs.usda.gov/conservatio...
And for more videos about other NRCS conservation-related projects, please visit the Minnesota NRCS TH-cam channel at: / @minnesotanrcs
www.nrcs.usda.gov/
/ nrcs_mn
Time stamps:
00:00:00 Introduction to Meyer dairy LLC and Nick Meyer
00:01:09 Intro to Mike Hemmann, Civil Engineer, NRCS, stacking slab, manure storage pits, EQIP
00:02:30 Working with NRCS and SWCD
00:03:38 Introduction to Mark Lefebrve, Conservation Planning Team Manager, SWCD, stacking slab
00:05:40 Improving the grain drying system with Natalie Wilwerding, Soil Conservationist, NRCS
00:06:03 Technical Service Provider and Energy Efficiency Audit
00:06:45 Energy efficient lighting, installing LED lights
00:07:20 Milking, milk cooling system and transport and floor heating system
00:08:25 Energy efficient ventilation system with variable frequency fans
00:10:15 Costs, instillation, and energy savings
00:12:34 Energy efficient boilers for floor warming system
00:13:10 Variable frequency pump for milk transfer, and milk cooling process, scroll compressor
00:13:47 Dairy cows, calves, and economics
00:15:16 Growing corn, alfalfa, and soybeans
00:15:52 NRCS and SWCD programs
#energyefficiency
#dairyfarm
#milkproducers

[@georgb4440]

If you haven't already look into solar panels for your barns.

[@pierreleroy6826]

All these bare soil!
Cover crops?
Blessings from France

[@minnesotanrcs]

I'm not sure whether they use no-till and/or cover crops on this dairy farm. They did not mention that.

[@eddeetz493]

Why not cover the lagoon, capture the methane to run the grain dryer, gas appiances, even a electricity generator to sell peak power back to the grid as another crop. You can make bio diesel also.

[@crazypeaches1]

Need a large dairy for that to work.