In colder climates winter storage crops have been stored in passive root cellars for centuries, striking the balance between outside conditions and storage conditions. Although modern refrigeration systems are generally used for large scale, longer-term storage of these crops some enterprises seek lower cost and high energy efficiency options. Outside air exchange systems use an …
Category Archives: Sustainable Agriculture
Solar Hot Water Heating in Vermont Greenhouses
Biomass Heating in Vermont Greenhouses
Farm to Plate Energy Success Stories
Vermont’s Comprehensive Energy Plan calls for obtaining 90% of the state’s energy from renewable sources by 2050 and reduce greenhouse gas emissions 50% from a 1990 baseline. What role can Vermont’s food system play in advancing this goal? The Energy Cross-cutting Team of the Farm to Plate Network has released seven Energy Success Stories that showcase farms, businesses, …
Oilseed Economics Update 2014
Yesterday we held our annual Oilseed Producer’s Meeting. At this meeting, I presented an economic overview of oilseeds in Vermont. Ina nutshell, Vermont has an installed on-farm biodiesel capacity of 600,000 gal/yr (5 sites) with a normalized initial cost of $1/gal of capacity (better than national average). Fuel can be produced for an average cost …
Vermont On-Farm Biodiesel – Costs of Production
I recently co-authored a summary of the economics of on-farm biodiesel with Netaka White from the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund. This report collects the economic and logistic learning from the past seven years of the Vermont Bioenergy Initiative (VBI). The VBI has supported a wide range of sustainable fuel related efforts in Vermont. Along with …
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How Refrigerators Work: “Principles of Refrigeration”
1944 US Office of Education video on refrigeration principles. Excellent. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XADVDjzFW-4&feature=endscreen
CoolBots(TM): Inexpensive Cold Storage
A downloadable PDF of this blog post is available here. Demand for on-farm cold storage of produce is increasing as local markets for these goods expand. Many local producers are asking about CoolBots™, a tool that works with a window air-conditioner to make a cooler out of an insulated space. This article collects information about CoolBots …
Energy and Waste in the Food System
Although estimates vary, we invest about 14 calories of fossil fuel-based energy and 15-20 calories of energy in general into every 1 calorie of food produced. And (here’s the kicker) 30-50% of the food produced never makes it to a digestive track. So those energy input numbers are actually low by any true measure of …
FIDO – A Do-it-yourself Temperature Monitor with Text Message Alerts
As I’ve mentioned in several other posts, I think the continual monitoring of conditions in greenhouses and food storage spaces is incredibly important for quality and safety and insightful for any operation. There is a really clever design for a do-it-yourself temperature monitoring system called Fido, on the FarmHack site. It uses an Arduino control …
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