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C E L E B R A T I N G
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Y E A R S
DAIRY ST R 25
February 10, 2024
“All dairy, all the time”™
Volume 25, No. 24
SDSU to close dairy production facility, disperse herd Change will not affect degree offerings By Jan Lefebvre jan.l@star-pub.com
BROOKINGS, S.D. — After three years of looking for a way to plan, budget and build a new dairy production facility at South Dakota State University in Brookings, the effort has been deemed unfeasible. The university will instead close the facility and disperse its dairy herd by the end of June. Dr. Joe Cassady, dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences for SDSU, said the decision was difcult. “People’s reactions to that are what you should expect when hard decisions get made about programs that matter,” Cassady said. However, the closing of the facility will not affect degree offerings. “We are not getting rid of any majors,” Cassady said. “We have three majors in the department — food science, dairy manufacturing and dairy production, with dairy production being the on-farm pro-
duction of milk. Food science and dairy manufacturing are functionally not impacted by the closing of the farm.” Only the dairy production facility will close. “We are not closing the Davis Dairy Manufacturing Plant; people have been confused about that,” Cassady said. “The making of the cheese and the ice cream and all of those things will continue as normal. The only change for (the plant) is that they will source their milk commercially because we will not be producing milk at our own university-owned farm.” Since the Davis Dairy Manufacturing Plant was paying the university’s farm for milk at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s milk price, Cassady said the university is not anticipating there being a nancial impact to the plant. For SDSU’s dairy production major, the university plans to partner with nearby dairy farms as sites to offer student experiences, education and research opportunities. “We want to continue to pro-
PHOTO SUBMITTED
A student milks cows in the double-8 parallel parlor at South Dakota State University in Brookings, South Dakota. The parlor and dairy produc�on facili�es at the school are slated to close by the end of June, but all majors offered in dairy science will con�nue. vide a quality educational experi- What we’re going to do is look at ence to the students in that major, the teaching outcomes that we have and that can best be done at this for dairy production and then work point by partnering with local dair- with our friends and local dairies to ies, several of which we’ve had nd strategies to most effectively long-term working relationships meet those teaching outcomes. We with in support of our research and feel condent that we can get our our teaching,” Cassady said. “It will students out on those farms.” absolutely be different. We’re not This school year, 23 students going to try to replace what we had. are in the dairy production program
at SDSU. The announcement that the dairy production facility would close drew concerns and questions from them as well as students with related majors. After the announcement was made, Cassady set up a meeting with students. “When I sat down with them, I said that I would not leave my chair until I’d heard every comment and every question,’” Cassady said. “I was there for two hours and 40 minutes.” Over 50 students attended the town hall, with eight remaining until the end, Cassady said. “I did the best I could to be there and listen and share and respond to the extent that I am able,” Cassady said. “They are hurt, they are upset, and they are disappointed — and that’s not surprising. Honestly, if they weren’t hurt, upset and disappointed, it would mean that this wasn’t important and our program didn’t matter, but our program is important, and it does matter.”
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Green energy proposal being considered in west central Minnesota Pipeline planned for transporting natural gas from Riverview digesters By Jan Lefebvre jan.l@star-pub.com
PUBLIC DOMAIN
This map shows the loca�ons of a natural gas pipeline system proposed by Dooley’s Natural Gas. The pipeline would connect renewable natural gas from manure biodigesters at four Riverview LLP sites in west central Minnesota to a planned compression sta�on near Murdock, Minnesota, where it would be injected into the exis�ng Alliance Transmission Pipeline.
BENSON, Minn. — Dooley’s Natural Gas of Willmar has led an application with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission as part of a plan to construct a 28-mile, renewable natural gas pipeline system. The pipeline would run in Swift, Chippewa and Kandiyohi counties in west central Minnesota and transport gas from manure biodigesters at four Riverview LLP dairies in the area. The application for the project, slated to cost $13.9 million, has been accepted by the PUC and is now being considered. Martha Koehl, a communications representative for Riverview,
said the manure biodigesters are being constructed at the farm sites by Amp Americas, a company based in Illinois. “We are excited about the prospect of continued economic development in western Minnesota and the opportunities that a pipeline project brings,” Koehl said. The Minnesota PUC has been asked to permit a part of the plan that involves a compression station to be constructed on a parcel of land near Murdock owned by Dooley Natural Gas. The gas would be compressed there and injected through a roughly 100-foot high-pressure pipeline into the already existing Alliance Transmission Pipeline that runs through the area.
The Alliance Transmission Pipeline would be responsible for tapping its existing line and installing the needed gas measurement equipment at the compression station. The Alliance Transmission Pipeline system runs from western Canada to Chicago. The rest of the planned Dooley’s Natural Gas pipeline would be low-pressure and transport natural gas produced from the manure biodigesters at the Riverview sites to the compressor station. The low-pressure pipeline must pass approval at the county and township levels, which is dictated by the county that maintains jurisdiction over the road right of way in which the pipeline will run. Approval of the pipeline plan also involves other entities, including the Department of Natural Re-
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