Green Me Now

From the no kidding department: Attendees at the Dairy Power Summit, held in October in New York, set a goal to power 32,000 homes by 2020 using methane captured from manure.

The term “dairy-supplied” seems to be preferable to “manure-supplied” among advocates, but the renewable energy benefit remains the same. Farmers and industry officials figure that 40% of all manure from New York dairy farms should do the trick, according to an announcement. Anaerobic digestion will help capture methane from the manure.

Attendees collaborated to develop an action plan. Projects include the small-farm digester initiative, which involves a contest that would award $1 million toward the development of a digester system for small-scale farms having two to 200 cows; and Cow Power, development of a voluntary rate-payer program in which residential and commercial electric customers pay 4 cents per kilowatt-hour extra on utility bills to help fund digesters. Formation of a nationwide, cross-industry alliance to promote biogas solutions is also part of the plan.

The effort is part of the state’s "45 by 15" program, under which New Yorkers hope to meet 45% of their electricity needs through renewable energy (30%) and improved energy efficiency (15%) by 2015.