WATER AND ELECTRICITY CONSUMPTION ON PASTURE-BASED AND CONFINED DAIRIES IN GEORGIA

Information on the environmental impacts and resource consumption resulting from milk production in the southeastern United States is limited. Knowledge of how the dairy industry consumes water and electricity will help to understand how this consumption might be decreased in the future. Monitoring strategies were developed for two dairies, one pasture-based and one confined, in Georgia in order to understand water and electricity consumption on each of the dairies. The strategies were developed with a limited budget, and demonstrate cost-effective methods of estimating agricultural water and electricity consumption using current meters, non-invasive flow meters, and existing water and utility meters. Annually, the confined dairy used 6.0 gal of water per lb of energy corrected milk production or 149,251 gal per cow, as well as 0.047 kWh/lb of energy corrected milk production or 1,163 kWh/cow. The pasture-based dairy used 15.8 gal of water per lb of energy corrected milk production or 176,128 gal/cow, as well as 0.048 kWh/lb of energy corrected milk production or 541 kWh/cow. Removing irrigation from these annual consumption calculations shows that the pasture-based dairy consumed 1.9 gal of water per lb of energy corrected milk production or 21,199 gal/cow, as well as 0.024 kWh of electricity per lb of energy corrected milk production or 265 kWh/cow, while the confined dairy used 3.8 gall lb of energy corrected milk production or 93,067 gal/cow, as well as 0.043 kWh/lb of energy corrected milk production or 1,073 kWh/cow. The results reported in this study are not intended to be used to compare confinement and pasture-based dairy systems. However, the water and electricity consumption data from each dairy scaled per cow provides standards to predict the water and electricity consumption of similar dairies based on the number of cattle on the farm in question. Also, the data in this study contribute to the available literature that lists the total water and electricity consumption of dairies, and provides previously unreported details regarding what composes this consumption.