World’s First Energy Independent Model Farming Operation

Greene’s Clean Mean Machine

Tommy Greene, president of T-Co Industries in Moultrie, addresses a crowd that gathered on the Daughtry Brothers Farm in Lenox Tuesday to see a demonstration of a revolutionary boiler system Green invented. The high-efficiency, pollution-free system, hailed as a major breakthrough for farmers fighting the high cost of fuel, runs off waste products, anything from sawdust to peanut vines. Commissioner of Agriculture Tommy Irwin flew in on his helicopter to watch the system in action, as it was to operate four tobacco drying barns on the Daughtry Brothers Farm in Lenox.

Energy-Efficient Farm

This year, the Expo will feature a working farm that operates entirely from fuels provided by farm crops.

T-Co Industries of Moultrie, Ga., is sponsoring the exhibit. The company plans to show a pig parlor, a feed-mixing room, grain bins, a farm office, a farm equipment building, two greenhouses, a farm home, four bulk tobacco barns, and grain-drying trailers connected to the tobacco barns.

The focal point of the farm is the T-Co automated waste-fired furnace. It provides all the energy for drying crops and heating farm buildings.

T-Co featured a small alcohol fuel exhibit at last year’s Expo. Since then, the company has concentrated its efforts on developing the furnace system. The furnace heats water to 210 degrees to 220 degrees Fahrenheit. The water flows through pipes into radiators that release the heat into the air. Fans then blow the heated air through the crops or buildings.

One sawdust-fueled furnace can cure up to seven barns of tobacco. But wood chips, cottonstalks, and other crop residues will also work. By replacing petroleum-based fuel with farm residue fuel, T-Co officials believe that farmers can save thousands of dollars each year.

Most of the T-Co furnaces have been installed on Georgia tobacco farms. After tobacco season is over, farmers, using kits provided by tobacco barn manufacturers, hook up grain trailers to the backs of the barns. They use the trailers for drying corn, soybean, and peanut crops. During the winter, the furnaces can be used to heat their homes.

At the exhibit, you’ll also see alcohol being used as fuel for a six-cylinder, 55-kilowatt generator. In order to run the generator on alcohol, T-Co officials adusted the generator’s carburetor and re-set the ignition. After the Expo, the generator will be reconverted to run on propane gas.

The generator will provide electrical energy for lighting the buildings, running the augers, and turning the fans. It will also produce enough electricity to power air conditioning for the mobile home farmhouse and the farm office.

After the alcohol has been made, the leftover wet grain can be mixed with other feed for livestock.

T-Co representative Sonny Batts explains, “Our company has build each of these systems separately at one time or another. During the Expo, we’ll put all the pieces together on a working farm that is energy independent.”

Automated Waste Fired Furnace and Hot Water Boiler

Will it work? It is working for several South Georgia farmers. The automated wasted fired furnace and hot water boiler is designed primarily as a drying operation. Its’ developers, T-Co Industries of Moultrie, feel it will have a revolutionary impact in reducing the energy dependence of the nation’s farmers.

The unit has been under development for over a year and came from what had began as a fuel alcohol experiment.

Although production of fuel alcohol is not economically feasible at this time, Tommy Greene, president of the firm, said it will be in the near future.

At this point, the end product is a portable boiler system connected to a waste fired furnace which Mr.Greene feels is capable of meeting a tremendous amount of farm energy needs.

T-Co Industries installed a waste fueled furnace on the Daughtrey Brothers farm near Lenox. The Daughtrey Brothers used sawdust and woodshavings as the major fuel source.

Water is heated through the boiler and furnace in the unit to a temperature of between 2,000 and 2,500 degrees. Thus this system is able to handle drying for five tobacco barns on the Daughtrey Farm.

Depending on the size of the unit, much more can be operated from a single system with connects running to greenhouses, livestock barns, power generators, and even the home.

During the past farming season T-Co Industries had five automatic waste fired furnaces in operation in this area. Results show these units cost the farmer an average of $47 per barn to cure tobacco versus the average $500 cost for curing with diesel.

Based on the current fuel costs, the average farmer can pay for the system in one year, even if he buys his waste material.

Mr.Greene admits “I am proud to be a part of developing a system that will hopefully play a large role in energy conservation.”

University of Georgia College of Agriculture

June 16, 1981
Mr. Tommy Green, President

Dear Tommy:

I think you and your associates already know how much the foreign visitors Charles Douglas, and I appreciate the excellent tour of your facilities, fine food, and hospitality. However, I think you folks will be interested to know that everybody continued to refer to that as one of the highlights of their five-day sojourn in Georgia, and most of them made specific appreciative comments on the written evaluations of their education experiences.

Indeed, our stop with you was most beneficial. Thank you for going through that trouble and expense. I am sure it will produce rich dividends in many ways and that your ventures will be highly successful.

Please give my regards and best wishes to all. Come to see us whenever you’re in Tifton.

Sincerely,
Millard L. Blakey, Coordinator
Manpower Development
MLB/cd

Thomas Greene, president of T-Co Industries, Moultrie, Ga., has designed a waste-fired boiler system that can be fueled with cotton stalks, corn stalks, and cobs, soybean, or peanut vines, pecan hulls, or sawdust.

He runs residues through a hammer mill, then burns them to heat water in a boiler. THe hot water passes through a radiator, and air blown through the radiator can be used for such jobs as curing tobacco and drying pecans or peanuts.

“Normally, growers spend $300 on propane per bulk barn to cure tobacco in six days,” Greene says. “We’ve found that farmers on five different farms are only spending $47 per barn for curing when they use a waste-fired boiler.

Based on current fuel costs, the average tobacco farmer can pay for a $31,000 boiler system in one year.