With around one billion pigs worldwide, the pork sector produces significant quantities of emissions per year that are now under government scrutiny with targets for reduction.
Due to the intensity of their production system, pigs emit significant levels of ammonia and greenhouse gases (GHGs) in their faeces and urine, which builds up in the barns.
With pork being the most consumed meat in the world, accounting for over 36% of total meat eaten, more pig housing is being erected to satisfy demand, but that also means increased emissions as collateral damage.
However, one company in Sweden has been examining that trend and has designed the ultimate technology to help reduce emissions in the form of housing modules with rotating floors.
Pig house emissions
Aptly named Moving Floor, the company was founded and is owned by two sisters, namely Peg Soderberg and Katja Lindvall, with Peg as the CEO.
The company is based on the Swedish island of Gotland and has developed housing modules, initially for calves and now pigs, with a continual moving floor that effectively cleans itself by scraping away the manure and urine.
The conveyor belt rotating floor is powered by air compression requiring eight bars to operate at previously set time intervals.
The company says this system can reduce ammonia emissions in the pig barn by up to 85%, compared to normal pig housing.
The module weighs 1,200kg, measures 5.4m X 2.4m, covering an area of 11.6m², and is 1.6m high. It is a wooden structure covered in stainless steel with an average energy consumption of under 100kWh/pig/year.
Demo barn
As part of a EU-funded project, Moving Floor hosts demo barns with its technology built in on a farm outside Vasteras owned by Tobias Pettersson producing 8,000 fattening pigs per year.
Peg Soderberg said: “Moving Floor has renovated parts of the farm and operates our technology in four barns there; one farrowing unit holding 12 sows, one nursery unit and two finisher units.
“In these barns we run the automatically cleaned floors as well as our automatic bedding machines, and we are digitally measuring ammonia emissions every 15 minutes.”
With the floor rotating the pig faeces is removed within two hours of a pig defecating. With the faeces removed, the overhead bedding robot can deliver straw or sawdust, as programmed to do so.
Moving Floor is operating a number of different trials in the barns to see how effective the technology really is.
Peg added: “We are taking measurements according to the VERA protocol meaning ammonia, dust and smell. Also, we are piloting a composting drum for manure handling with the idea of closing the loop of nitrogen as much as possible.
“Since we have a rapid removal of faeces from the barn we can minimise ammonia emissions in the barn, preserve the nutrients in the manure and strive for an energy efficient process of the manure into a chemically stable organic fertiliser that can be spread in the fields.
“We have ear-marked and taken more than 17,000 pictures of the pigs, following them from birth to slaughter. The pictures are annotated by Prof. Mate Zoric at SVA, State Veterinary Institute, and scored based on conditions of hooves, knees and belly,” she added.
SVA is also involved in analysing sickness and antibiotics consumption. An analysis of climate impact will be completed by the IVL, Swedish Institute of Environment.
“We are already seeing indications of lower emissions of ammonia, pointing at reaching the target of only 1.1kg per finisher place per year,” Peg continued.
“Concentration of ammonia in the barns span from 2-5ppm generally, which from an animal welfare perspective is a good thing.”
Animal welfare
The Moving Floor modules can improve animal welfare in terms of providing solid floors that can support the use of bedding and enrichment materials. Also, the stocking density can be varied, without it affecting the cleanliness of the floors.
The company says all of this can play a major part in the stopping of tail docking, and providing a system more in line with consumer demands and expectations.
The Moving Floor system can be installed either in new barns or in older established units. Animals kept in clean and hygienic conditions have a better chance of performance in terms of feed conversion and daily growth rates.
Compared to scraping concrete floors manually, the labour saving with the rotating floor modules is significant, and also for the distribution of bedding.
Moving Floor says its goal is to provide automatic cleaning for barns and make this become a new industry standard.
Peg added: “We hope that Moving Floor can play a part in a quick transitioning of European farms towards becoming more sustainable and animal welfare-orientated.
“Looking ahead, we are working on a smart system to run the floors according to ammonia emissions. Basically, we set the allowed level of ammonia emissions on the specific farm and let the system run and optimise automatically based on algorithms.
“This will also make it possible for the farms to generate reports that can be sent to controlling bodies, for compliance with ammonia regulations.”
Moving Floor says the average payback of its system is three years. The company has already fitted units across Europe and China, and is talking to potential customers in other regions.
