Grainswest - Spring 2019

Spring 2019 Grains West 24 FEATURE “In August, when the outside temperature is warmer, we’ll have all three fans on heat and the grain will just cool in the bin,” said Wade, who is Alberta Barley’s region three director-at- large, he added it’s the most economic month during which to dry grain. “Later on, when we’re drying lots in October, we’ll do the first two burners heating and the bottom one cooling, so we’re not getting condensation when we’re dumping it hot.” The brothers’ dryer is top of the line, but they did pass on the fully-automated smartphone control add-on since their dryer is viewable from all points in the yard and someone is inevitably around moving grain. The dryer, a four-fold capacity upgrade, runs off a three-phase, 125 kVA diesel gen-set. McAllister looked into having three-phase brought into the farm yard and discovered it would have cost “hundreds of thousands of dollars.” Beyond that, the monthly distribution charges would have been around $400. By using a gen-set, he’s not paying a distribution charge for the months he’s not using the dryer. In addition, the gen- set serves as a backup power supply for the farm itself, should there ever be a power outage. A three-phase gen-set does carry a cost, though. New units can retail for $50,000 while even second-hand machines can run as much as $30,000 depending on its hour count and condition. The gen-sets run on gas. Since marked fuel is exempt from both the provincial and federal carbon taxes, so farmers can utilize it for grain drying. “We feel that because you don’t have to pay carbon tax technically on farm fuel, we can use our farm diesel to burn in the generator,” he said, adding that for a 1,200- to 1,300-bushel load in the new dryer, it will take about four litres of diesel, the same amount their older, less efficient dryer needed to dry 250 to 300 bushels. However, they cannot escape the natural gas cost nor its attached Purchased 24 years ago, Scott Keller’s 1995 IBEC Vertec 5500 dryer system has annually handled 80 per cent of his grain crop since 2016.