Ideas for Farmers
Some current projects and their goals are below to show what a project on your farm might look like:
Compost Heat and CO2 Capture and Use – Composting uses micro-organisms to break-down organic materials rendering a valuable soil amendment. Two outputs from composting are heat and CO2, resources which are normally lost in the composting process and emitted into the atmosphere. Students working on this project should expect to work collaboratively with the farm and a small team of civil engineering students in the development and design for the heat transfer and CO2 recovery systems.
Aquaponics Fish Waste Dewatering System – With many aquaculture systems, fish waste can be difficult to manage. Bigelow Brook Farm currently takes their fish waste, decants some of the nutrient water from it, and dumps the sludge in their fields since it is a small quantity. Unfortunately, many places are not able to dispose of their waste in this method. The few commercial ways to dewater sludge are primarily designed for larger scale systems. The goal of this project is to develop a small dewatering system that makes it possible to use or sell the solid waste, produced by fish in the aquaponics system, as a soil supplement.
Design of a Solar-powered Ventilation System for High Tunnels – High Tunnels are widely used in agriculture to extend the growing season and protect crops from adverse weather conditions. However, during the hot days of summer, maintaining optimal temperatures and humidity levels inside these tunnels becomes a significant challenge. The goal of this project is to design a ventilation system that can effectively extract hot air from one end of the High Tunnel to the other, ensuring a stable internal environment conducive to plant growth. The system will use solar panels and will operate automatically based on adjustable temperature and humidity conditions.
Creating an App for a Crowd-sourced Farm Management Knowledge Base – In the original iteration of this project, Ask Aunt Nellie (AAN) was to be a collection of spreadsheets detailing the knowledge needed to manage small-scale diversified farms. Resources will include a crowd-sourced farm inventory, agricultural suppliers, and farm-friendly professionals. The goal is to create a user-friendly app that serves as an interface for a database of all the stuff farmers need to run their businesses. The three core functions will be the abilities to search for, ask for, and contribute knowledge. There will also be the ability to “browse” categories and info within categories. Some examples of categories are tractor implements, irrigation supplies, and bulk materials.