UPDATE: THE SOLAR PIG FARROWING HOUSE

(Page 2 of 2)

July/August 1979
By the Mother Earth News editors 
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And sun power is being put to work in a number of ways around the Murphy/Feyen farm. A solar grain-drying system will be ready to go into operation next fall, while a solar-heated machine shed-which also has its warm air ducted into the floor-will be complete by the time you read this. The Feyen house is also being redesigned to incorporate heat from the sun, but that project won't even get underway for almost a year.

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In the meantime, the DOE is collecting data on the ratio between the amount of solar energy available to the barn's collector, and the number of Btu's the system actually produces.

"So far," Feyen notes, "we're running at about 60% efficiency. Commercial collectors can sometimes get up to 80% and more ... but then, such units cost 10 times as much as ours did. The DOE also wants to know about cost-effectiveness: how long it will take the system to pay for itself. As far as we're concerned, the rooftop 'furnace' paid its way in two seasons, but we've given the Energy Department officials a conservative four-year estimate.

"The fact is, it's hard for folks to believe just how well our inexpensive, easy-to-build unit does work!"

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