you have dinner with. You work with them.”

Werkhoven says it was at one of those meetings that someone from the tribes suggested that an anaerobic digester might be built to produce electricity using manure from dairy operations.

“They had a simple theory: cows are better than condos,” Werkhoven says. “Not only do you have fewer landowners to deal with, but you have landowners who have a vested interest in protecting [the environment]. We have more in common, oftentimes, with the tribes than we have apart; and we have a tremendous amount in common with [environmentalists] like John [Sayre]. It’s a real blessing to be able to work with folks like that.”

“I have been involved in salmon protection and restoration for more years than I care to admit, probably about 35,” Sayre says. “In the process, I realized that you don’t save salmon or anything in a vacuum. Farmers and the farmlands along rivers have the best potential to restore salmon habitat. Farmers are not the enemy; they are potentially the best friend that salmon could have.”

Enter the Qualco Energy Corp.
In 2003, the Sno/Sky Agricultural Alliance, Northwest Chinook Recovery, and the Tulalip Tribes “put a little sweat into the game,” Werkhoven says. They agreed to work together on an anaerobic digester project. The tribes received a $256,000 grant from the U.S. DOE to conduct an environmental assessment for the project, which was completed in September 2005. The partners then formed Qualco Energy Corp., a nonprofit organization where the groups are equal partners. The tribes were awarded a $1.5 million loan in 2006 from the state’s Energy Freedom Loan fund for the project.

Werkhoven says the tribes have led the effort. “They have provided excellent project management,” he says. “They have very good people and they hire the best. It’s a real privilege to be working with them.”

Crews began building the anaerobic digester in July on the 280-acre site of the former Washington State Reformatory Dairy Farm, which for 60 years was a prison farm. The farm closed in 2002.

The anaerobic digester will have enough capacity to digest feedstock from 2,200 cows. The Werkhoven Dairy with its 1,000 milking cows and two neighboring dairies will collect manure from approximately 1,500 cows to supply feedstock for the digester, which will take six weeks to fill and rise to the required temperature for digestion.

Each of the farms involved currently flush manure into lagoons or scrape manure from stalls to manage the solids on-site. The manure is later applied to fields. The waste collection systems at the farms are being adapted to pump fresh manure from the farms to the digester where methane gas will be produced. The methane will be burned by combustion engines to generate electricity. The remaining liquids and solids will then be separated. The digested liquid effluent will be pumped back to the farms to be applied to fields as fertilizer. The digested solids will be dried and marketed as compost or animal bedding. The digester was expected to be ready to accept feedstock by the end of October.

If all goes as planned, generators at the Qualco facility will begin producing electricity in January to be sold to the Snohomish County Public Utility District. The generators will produce 450 kilowatts of power, enough to power approximately 300 homes, says Neil Neroutsos, a spokesman for the PUD. He says the PUD and Qualco continue to negotiate a power purchase agreement.

The PUD became involved in 2004 soon after the project was initially proposed, Neroutsos says. “We look at the project as an opportunity to educate the public about how this power source works,” he says, “and to conduct educational tours and increase overall understanding of biogas generation.”

Neroutsos says the biogas digester will help the PUD to meet a portion of the utility’s renewable portfolio standards requirements.

Future Plans
Using the digester might eventually allow Werkhoven and the other farmers to be more competitive. “This project will allow participating dairies to grow their herds to the size that best fits their business plan, management style and future goals,” Reiner says, “without being restricted by the number of cows allowed on a per-acre basis.”

“We hope to be able to continue to expand our dairy,” Werkhoven says. “We would love to have the opportunity to build additional digester capacity.”

Sayre says Qualco could build anaerobic digesters at the site to serve more than just dairy farmers. “There are a whole bunch of other things that are now going into landfills that can go in there to produce methane,” he says. “Since we are close to Seattle, I think there is going to be a lot of other sources of feedstock that are going to come forward.” Sayre says examples include whey from cheese makers, waste eggs from chicken farms and other food waste. “Look at all of the food that gets wasted in this country on an annual basis,” he says.

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