Primary production

This farm installed a heat exchange system - it extracts the heat from the waste water and uses it to pre-warm the incoming water in the dairy shed. It reduces energy use as less energy is needed to heat each new batch of water to the 85 degrees celsius required for the next wash.

Monitoring has shown that the system is on target to achieve an annual energy saving of 30%. That equates to a cut in CO2 emissions of about one tonne a year.

Winemakers Pernod Ricard are set to cut their natural gas bill by $21,000 a year thanks to a new hot-water boiler at the company's Auckland wine-bottling plant.

The $55,000 Northvale boiler is used to heat water for cleaning the equipment at the plant. It is almost 12% more efficient than the steam boiler it replaced, and it is expected to reduce the amount of natural gas the company uses by 479,000 kWh a year.

Soil moisture metering is a good investment for farmers who want to stop over-irrigating and cut their energy costs, according to Lincoln University Dairy Farm manager Peter Hancox.

Installing a soil moisture metering system helped him avoid unnecessarily irrigating an 80-hectare block on at least 32 days during the 2008/2009 growing season-and cut his power bill by more than $2000.

Dairy farmers and technical experts share their experiences across four demonstration projects using a variety of solar water heating and waste heat recovery systems to reduce energy costs in the dairy shed.