Dairy Energy Support Tool

About

The Dairy Energy Decision Support Tool is collaborative initiative between Teagasc, Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) and Munster Technological University. The tool aims to quantify and reduce dairy farm electricity consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and production costs through data analysis and mathematical modelling. This tool is separated into two sub-sections:

1. The Technology Calculator is engineered to predict specific dairy farm electricity consumption, CO₂ emissions and cost, both in real-world and hypothetical scenarios. This allows for the calculation of potential payback periods and cost savings attributed to the installation of energy technologies such as variable speed drives (VSD) for milking machines, solar PV panels, solar thermal, heat recovery and wind turbines, on a farm-to-farm basis. 

2. The Consumption Summary provides a comprehensive summary of electricity consumption data from an exhaustive audit of Irish dairy farms where remote data recording commenced in 2008. Electricity consumption, cost and related carbon emissions are broken down according to each dairy farm electricity consuming process relative to both milk production and per dairy cow and displayed in easily read, downloadable plots. Similarly, this breakdown is available per month, highlighting the trend in consumption throughout the year. Variable electricity consumption cost figures may be analysed according to either a day and night or flat rate pricing structure.

Use the dairy energy support tool