TECHNOLOGY
Water saving technology By Tony Benny
Award-winning ag tech can halve the amount of freshwater used on farms and has the potential to save billions of litres each year.
D
airy farmers will be able to halve the amount of water they use washing down their yards thanks to new technology developed by Lincoln University scientists and commercial partner Ravensdown. The ClearTech effluent treatment system has been installed at the Lincoln University Dairy Farm and in its first month in action, more than 600,000 litres of water was saved. “Our plant has been fully operational since the start of milking and already the amount of freshwater we’ve saved is remarkable. We’re saving at least 50% of the water used to wash the yard,” farm manager Peter Hancox says. Over the whole 10-month season, Hancox says, water savings are expected to total 6 million litres. Soil science professors Keith Cameron and Hong Di, and Ravensdown, developed the system which collects the effluent and treats it with a coagulant to bind effluent colloidal particles together to settle them out from the water. The treated water can then be recycled, with the leftover treated effluent being safely used to recycle nutrients back to the pasture without odour. The ClearTech system also reduces pressure on effluent storage capacity and reduces leaching losses of phosphate and E.coli from the treated effluent when spread on the land. “These are huge benefits for farmers, with really significant implications for farmers’ relationships with the natural environment and their local communities,” Hancox says. He believes the set-up and maintenance costs are far outweighed by benefits to both the farm and the wider community. “Every litre of wastewater recycled is a litre of freshwater saved,” he says. The system comprises computer
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Professors Keith Cameron and Hong Di with the Lincoln University Dairy Farm ClearTech effluent treatment system.
Lincoln University farm manager Peter Hancox says the ClearTech system has huge benefits for farmers.
processors, controllers, tanks, pumps and pipes, and sits between the dairy yard and effluent pond. Ravensdown estimates that if ClearTech was used on all New Zealand dairy farms, total fresh water use could be reduced by up to 42 billion litres a year, the equivalent of 17,000 Olympicsized swimming pools “Farmers want to do the right thing and ClearTech delivers us a system where
we can make a real difference to our environmental impact, without busting the budget and with no disruption to our normal farm operations,” Hancox says. The system won the Science & Research Award at the Primary Industries Awards in 2019, the South Island Agricultural Fieldays Agri-Innovation Award and a Highly Commended Award at the 2019 National Fieldays Innovation Awards. n
DAIRY FARMER
November 2020
