by BETTER FARMING STAFF
“It’s getting more and more difficult to dispose of those waste materials,” says Paul Nichol, manager of the Huron Business Development Corporation (HBDC), one of the players involved in the initiative. Perth Environmental Services and Atwood Pet Food are two others.
The group has commissioned environmental engineering firm Conestoga Rovers and Associates to do an inventory of the different types of materials that could be used to produce biodiesel within a 90-kilometre radius of Milverton.
Nichol says along with sources of offal (mostly specified risk materials from cattle, the principal target of the enhanced feed ban regulations), the study will document all potential sources of fats, oils and greases from agricultural processing within the area.
It will locate farm operations, food processors, abattoirs and deadstock operations – “just getting a handle on how much is there, what type of stuff are we really talking about, what type of treatment process does it have to go through and what’s the best technology to do that with.”
A study in hand may help to attract interest in developing a large-scale biodiesel plant in the area, he says. “Biodiesel is very, very sexy right now. For good reasons people are looking at different feedstocks.”
In the meantime, the focus will be on how to generate on-farm biodiesel production using the materials.
Along with doing the inventory, Conestoga will conduct some “recipe testing” and engineering trial work for the production facilities.
“We are hoping by this summer to be in the position of saying, ok, we know how to make this work,” says Nichol. By August, producers would be able to start buying equipment and agreements would be set up with suppliers.
Nichol says a Milverton-area producer and truck hauler approached the HBDC with the idea. The hauler, who has been transporting specified risk material waste for Atwood Pet Food, pointed out that such materials no longer can be spread as fertilizer or used as pet food.
The possibility of using the materials to create home heating oil was also considered but some of the regulatory requirements for heating oil “eliminated that option,” Nichol says.
The project recently obtained nearly $75,000 of federal funding but is otherwise being privately financed.
In March, Gencor Foods Inc. closed its doors for good in Kitchener. In a statement explaining its decision to close, the company noted “regulations enacted in the United States for Specified Risk Materials are much less rigorous than the regulations established in Canada.” BF
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