St-Eugene couple awarded Canadian farming prize for innovation

When George and Linda Heinzle were married in 1986 and expanded their dairy cow milking operation shortly thereafter, they had little idea of the example they would later set for the local farming community - and the country as a whole.

On their 550-acre property in St-Eugene, home to Terryland Farms, the couple has slowly expanded their dairy farm operation in both a traditional and an innovative way.

"I bought this farm in 1983 and there were a hundred acres of land and 30 cows at that time," recalls George Heinzle, sipping coffee in his home last week. "It was a small farm, and in 1986, I got married to my wife Linda and we expanded the farm continuously. We did a large expansion in 2003, doubling the herd size from 70 to 140 milking cows; then the replacement doubled, so we now have a total of 280 head Holstein cattle."

However, when the couple traveled to Toronto in mid-February to attend the 2010 Canadian International Farm Show, their farm operation was recognized as Producer of the Year for a more innovative achievement: bringing efficiency and sustainability to the agricultural practice.

From early 2005 to late 2007, the couple set out to work on a combined anaerobic digester and power generation project, at an eventual cost of about $650,000. Two and a half years later, the 180-kilowatt generator has now operated for 20,000 hours and is currently connected to a Hydro One transformer station on nearby Maple Row.

The Heinzles purchased and installed a second 180-kilowatt generator and are simply waiting for the contract details to be presented by the Ontario Power Authority.

Once that contract is established, the couple will eventually earn up to 19.5 cents per kilowatt-hour of generated power under the provincial Feed-In Tariff program, up from the 12 cents they now receive. At that rate, the system will bring in monthly revenues of $24,000 - minus their own electricity costs - and will power about 100 homes.

Not to mention, the couple is also planning to mount solar panels on their farm's south-facing barn and buildings, an installation that should generate another 100 kilowatts of energy for the grid.

"Hopefully we can finish up that project by this fall, and that would supply quite a few houses," says George. "But I'm sure that with the two generators and the solar we can supply the whole town of St-Eugene with electricity."

How the current system works

An automatic system gathers the manure from their dairy farm operation and sends it to the biodigester, a process that reduces the pathogens by 98 per cent and the manure odours by 90 per cent. To boost the biogas output potential, the manure is combined with locally acquired food processing waste - mainly, fat and blood.

"When we pass the manure through the digester, it doesn't stick anymore when it comes out, it kills the pathogens and it improves the fertilizer value of the manure," explains George. "It has got a lot of important benefits and advantages. In the future, I think it may become even more important as more urban people move out to the country and as farms get larger.

"I can see a time when every large livestock farmer is going to have a digester."

Linda agrees, yet emphasizes the amount of work involved in the maintenance process: "The digester is not something you can put up and just walk away. It is maintenance, we can't turn our backs and say, 'you just build this and oh, wonderful.'"

To simplify the process, however George and Linda make use of a computer program that digitally monitors the digester and pasteurizer system, verifying the liquid levels with sensors. Furthermore, the application is online-based and also sends alerts to cell phones via text messages.

"We have a program that we can follow from the house, or the barn," said Linda.

"Or anywhere we have Internet access," George adds, smiling.

The farm receives a delivery of slightly more than 60 tonnes a week of the food processing waste. The so-called "sludge" must first be pasteurized in an old milk tank, before being blended with the manure.

"We only take material that nobody else wants," George says, referring to the food processing wastes.

The digester then goes to work: "It's called a digester because that's what it's doing, digesting the material and turning it into methane. [The by-product] is a dark liquid that stays there for 40 to 45 days."

The by-product from the digester - mostly manure - can later be used as a fertilizer, while the sludge becomes biogas.

"All the nutrients are still there, which is good because we need those nutrients to feed our crops. Actually, since we got the digester, we have greatly reduced our fertilizer bills."

The digested manure has also been a boon to the crops.

"The Alfred College campus sometimes takes truckloads of digested manure and compares it to undigested manure," notes Linda. "And the digested area of their plots is doing much better."

Environmental and health benefits

George explains that the process kills 98 per cent of the pathogens in the manure.

"We all still remember what happened in Walkerton, when E. coli got into the water supply. Well, if the manure does not contain E. coli, they can't even point the finger at the farmer."

Asked about their reasons for starting out such a project, George replies, "We just wanted to do something good for the environment, via the reduction of methane emissions. We extract all of the methane out of the manure, or nearly all of it, so the effluent that comes out of the digester goes into the reserve to be stored until we can apply it to our crops.

"We only apply the manure when it's best for the soil to absorb, in the spring, and [later] in the summer a lot of the methane goes into the atmosphere [due to the heat]. But if the manure is already digested, we have less methane emissions.

"We generate electricity, so if every farmer could do this maybe we would reduce the need for coal-fired power plants. We can generate electricity in a much more environmentally-friendly way."

Even with the addition of a second generator, the operation is still generating a greater amount of energy than can actually be used; in fact, a portion of it is simply released into the outdoors.

Some of the excess heat, however, keeps the comfort levels high around the Heinzle home.

"The excess heat from the engine heats the house, the pool, the milking parlour, the shop, and the exhaust heat from the digester is all captured," says Linda. "The pool is always at 35 or 40 degrees, and the shop is always nice and warm.

"It's nice, we like it warm in the winter."

Finally, the couple also uses an Ontario-built Energrow oil-pressing system whereby they take their grown soybeans, pass them through the hammer mill, and press them to squeeze out the oil residue.

The soybeans are cooked - providing a protein supplement for the cows - and the extracted oil is used for fuel on the farm as a mix with diesel.

"That project is working quite well now," George laughs, saying he believes the mixed fuel has also managed to bring an old dump truck engine in line with the current emissions standards in Ontario.

On his inspiration for beginning the project, he adds: "I grew up in Austria and we had digesters, there was one close to our place 30 years ago [...] but in the last 10 to 15 years they have really came a long way in Europe and several of my friends have digesters. So I knew, if it works over there, it's going to work here."

Every day is a new challenge, the couple admits.

"We are kind of the guinea pigs on this."