Many farms around the world are now looking for ways to use renewable energy to power their farming practices. Many farms use photovoltaic power to pump water for livestock or to power electric fences around animal pens. In Spain solar food dryers are used to dry flowers and leaves for teas and in Kenya the Kenya Wildlife Service uses solar powered fences to prevent elephants from damaging crops.
Recently an inventive farmer in Northern Ireland began generating energy using the movement of his cows, who would normally walk for around 8 hours a day whilst grazing in the fields. William Taylor designed an inclined belt that slides when a cow walks on it, rather than having a powered treadmill similar to those used by humans in a gym. The motion of the belt spins a gearbox which drives a generator. Taylor claims that a cow on the treadmill produces almost two kilowatts of power and this is sufficient to keep four milking machines going. Obviously with an entire herd generating energy, huge savings would be made in electricity. A feed box encourages the cow to continue walking on the belt. Apart from the green energy produced, studies suggest that cows that exercise produce more milk.
Image Source: Trend Hunter
In Israel Peleg/Burshtein Architects and landscape architect Nathan Gulman recently won a competition run by the Israeli Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. The theme of the competition was to create an upgraded chicken coop to improve on those run by families in Galilee that are inefficient and polluting.
Source: Peleg/Burshtein
The Peleg/Burshtein winning design is a prefabricated chicken coop which provides its own renewable energy and processes its own waste in a closed loop system. The coop is 200 foot long and incorporates solar panels and a wind farm to provide renewable energy and the manure is converted into biofuel using the waste treatment system. The Israeli Ministry hopes the coop design will be used in future farms in both Israel and abroad.
Farming is yet another area where there is enormous potential for energy harvesting, particularly solar and wind harvesting.
Top image showing solar water pump for cattle, source NREL
For more read : Energy Harvesting and Storage for Electronic Devices 2009-2019
