Improved productivity and sustainability in high value dairy production through the deployment of low cost wireless methane sensors

奶牛养殖的集约化导致消费者对奶牛场的看法与现实之间越来越脱节。因此，当消费者被告知奶牛场的部分做法时，最重要的结论是，目前的农场做法并不能保护环境;三分之一的成年人认为，乳制品的种植和生产对整体气候变化有重大影响。农场和乳制品公司能够清楚地沟通，并提供其业务对当地和全球环境产生积极影响的证据，不仅更有可能保持经济上的可行性，而且能够进入更高价值的市场。确保乳制品供应链可持续性的要求是建立一个经过验证的标准框架，以认证最佳实践，从而奖励生产实践，最大限度地减少对气候的不利影响。10%的？该国的温室气体排放总量来自农业（每年46.3百万吨二氧化碳当量）。农业产生的主要温室气体是反刍动物产生的甲烷（56%），其次是化肥产生的一氧化二氮（31%）。农业中最重要的温室气体是甲烷，主要来自反刍动物，其温室气体影响是CO2的34倍。在全球范围内，牛排放了13%的甲烷。乳制品行业已开始通过遗传学和使用饲料添加剂来解决减少甲烷排放的迫切需要。然而，目前还没有甲烷测量的行业标准，可以独立地量化在运营农场上产生的甲烷的质量，这推动了对可靠的成本效益测量方法的近期需求。研究型农场已经部署了带有吸气式甲烷测量设备的自动化喂料系统，例如Green-feed，但这些设备的价格非常昂贵（每台约7万英镑），这是广泛采用的一个重大障碍。该项目旨在提供一种低成本、可靠的甲烷传感器，可以快速改装到现有的农场设备上，例如挤奶机器人，安装成本最低，以增加温室气体测量设备的采用。该方法与创建传感器网络的内场部署，以提供实时测量与当前的遥感调查方法更高的粒度兼容。电力收集解决方案消除了对硬接线（其不实用或不具成本效益）和电池电力两者的需要，由于需要定期更换，这是不可接受的，并且也是环境不可接受的。

The intensification of dairy farming has resulted in an increasing disconnect between the vision that consumers have of a dairy farm and the reality. As a consequence, when consumers are provided with a partial picture of the practices employed on dairy farms, the over-riding conclusion is that current farm practices do not protect the environment; 1 in 3 adults believe that the farming and production of dairy foods significantly contributes to overall climate change. The farms and dairy companies able to clearly communicate and provide evidence of the positive impact that their operations have on both the local and global environment are more likely to remain not only economically viable but are able to gain access to higher value markets. The requirement to ensure the sustainability of the dairy supply chain is to establish a validated standard framework enabling the certification of best practices for rewarding production practices minimise the detrimental impact on climate.In the UK, it is currently estimated that?10% of the?country's total GHG emissions come from agriculture, (46.3 Mt CO2e pa). The main GHG from agriculture is methane from ruminants (56%), followed by nitrous oxide from fertilisers (31%).?The most important greenhouse gas in farming is methane predominantly from ruminants which has a GHG impact 34 times that of CO2\. Globally cattle contributes to 13% of methane emissions. The dairy sector has begun to address the pressing need to reduce methane emissions through genetics and with the use of feed additives. However, presently, there is no industry standard for methane measurement that can independently quantify the mass of methane produced on an operational farm, driving a near-term need for reliable cost-effective measurement methods. Research farms have deployed automated feeder systems with aspirated methane measurement devices e.g. Green-feed, however these are prohibitively expensive (~£70k per unit), a significant barrier to widespread adoption.The project aims to deliver a low-cost, robust methane sensor which can be rapidly retrofitted to existing farm equipment e.g. milking robots with minimal installation cost to increase the adoption of GHG measurement equipment. The approach is compatible with creating sensor networks for infield deployment to provide real-time measurement with higher granularity over current remote sensing survey approaches. The power harvesting solution eliminates the need for both hard wiring (which is not practical or cost effective) and battery power, unacceptable due to the need for regular changes and also environmentally unacceptable.