Clean Profit from Alternative Fuels

Biofuel feedstocks offer income opportunities for farmers and ranchers.

A TRIO OF green domes disrupt the pastoral landscape surrrounding farmer Aaron Stuaffer’s anaerobic lagoon in New York. They’re an industrialized contrast to the sugar maples and American been trees that cover much of the second-generation farmer’s 4500-head dairy operation. They don’t exactly scream sustainability.

But looks can be deceiving.

Those three methane digesters dramatically reduce Stauffer’s carbon footprint while bringing in diversified income. “It makes us more environmentally sustainable. We feel that we can operate better and longer,” he says.

To feed the digesters, Stauffer sends the farm’s manure to the facility’s owner, LF Bioenergy, which produces renewable natural gas by depriving the organic matter of oxygen within the domes. After processing a few weeks, the manue flows back into the lagoons, without the smell, for use as fertilizer. The biogas is injected into pipelines for residential and commercial consumption.

“This year, as they’ve gotten things up and running, there has been some profit share coming back. We didn’t invest anything into the digesters except some time and advice, so the profit share has been good,” Stauffer says.

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