11-26 FB Anaerobic Digester Makes Money

 Hey dairy farmers or any CAFO operators, here’s a chance to clean up in more ways than one. Turn your manure into cash by selling the output of an Anaerobic digester to your power company.  The Idaho Public Utilities Commission has approved a sales agreement allowing Idaho Power Co. to buy the output from the Bettencourt B6 dairy anaerobic digester located near Jerome.

The agreement, between Idaho Power and Cargill Environmental Finance, is for 2.13 megawatts. The purchase price will be equal to 85 percent of a Dow Jones market price that is the weighted average of the daily on-peak and off-peak price for non-firm energy. Gene Fadness, Public Information Officer for The Idaho Public Utilities Commission, tells us how much 2.13 megawatts is…and it’s more than a couple of hair dryers: “It’s 2.13 megawatts so it’s enough power if you figure a megawatt according to Idaho Power Company is enough to power 650 homes, so 2 megawatts you get up to 1300 homes.”

We have done stories in the past about a company that is willing to put up the cost of an anaerobic digester for back end (no pun intended) profit from the manure.