http://inhabitat.com/cows-on-treadmills-could-produce-six-percent-of-the-worlds-power/
Cows on Treadmills Could Produce Six Percent of the World’s Power
by Sarah Parsons, 04/19/10
At one farm in Northern Ireland, cows are giving up green grass in favor of green power. In order to decrease his reliance on fossil fuels for electricity, farmer William Taylor created the Livestock Power Mill, a treadmill that generates power as cows walk on it. It may seem like a kooky idea, but Taylor could really be onto something: According to his calculations, if the world’s 1.3 billion cattle used treadmills for eight hours a day, they could produce six percent of the world’s power.
Cows are locked into a pen on top of a non-powered, inclined belt. To avoid sliding down the incline, the cow needs to walk, which turns the belt. As the belt turns, it spins a gearbox, which powers a generator. A feed box hooked to the front of the device keeps cows occupied and happy. One cow can produce about two kilowatts of electricity, enough energy to power four milking machines.
It may seem cruel to make cows sweat it out on a treadmill, but the routine is actually quite similar to the animals’ normal behavior. Cows walk about eight hours a day while grazing. Doing that walking on a treadmill provides the same amount of exercise with the added bonus of renewable power production.
For now, the Livestock Power Mill is just a prototype on Taylor’s farm. But if the idea catches on, we could see farms all over the world employing the useful device. Taylor estimates that a small farm could earn back a 50-cow system’s $100,000 price tag in a mere three years.
Via Popular Science
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33 Responses to “Cows on Treadmills Could Produce Six Percent of the World’s Power”
Read more: Cows on Treadmills Produce Electricity for Farms | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building
Sugar Mountain Farm
Pastured Pigs, Sheep & Kids
in the mountains of Vermont
Read about our on-farm butcher shop project:
http://SugarMtnFarm.com/butchershop
http://SugarMtnFarm.com/csa
Now just add a methane capture mechanism for the cow\’s gas and store it underground when you take out natural gas.
” An original type, form, or instance serving as a basis or standard for later stages.
An original, full-scale, and usually working model of a new product or new version of an existing product.
An early, typical example.”
The idea is not bad the design is in the rough so no need to choke on your coffee.
Integral Fast Reactors eat nuclear waste and weapons. They burn 90% of the waste, and the tithe that is left over is so “hot” it burns itself out in just 300 years (and is then safe). The good news is we’ve got enough nuclear waste to run the world for 500 years! So we do not have an *energy* crisis as such, but a liquid fuels infrastructure crisis. Once we’ve converted our transport and mining systems to electricity, we’ll be in a much more sustainable place.
As someone who works with these animals, William Taylor should know better. This is simply inhumane.
Oh right, because THAT’S inhumane.
Exploiting other species to further our own agenda… gee, sounds very familiar also very primitive. less like ‘Innovative’ design more like pointless frivolous crap.