Ideas for Tomorrow
Resident
I have lived in Utah all my life. My father used to work for Norbest, so I grew up thinking about how local agriculture effects the community. I believe strongly that local is best. I have some suggestions that I have researched thoroughly that I'm sure can have a positive impact on local
agriculture.
1. Install anaerobic digesters on as many farms as possible. Anaerobic digesters are a win, win, win, win, win solution to several problems. They pay for themselves in about 5 years (especially if subsidized), they provide local clean energy in either the form of natural gas or electricity
generated from burning the gas, they are capable of providing power and heat for the dairies and farms that use them usually with enough to spare (sell), they sequester natural gas that would otherwise enter the atmosphere (methane is more than 30 times more harmful as a greenhouse gas than CO2), and they keep the farms from polluting ground. Again, using aerobics digesters helps keep local farms viable which in return produces local
products and local power.
2. Educate and promote straw bale construction. Straw bale construction is a tried and true building method. Some of its benefits include: the use of local building materials (straw) which is often seen as a waste product, extremely high insulative values (R value of 30+), straw is
a completely renewable resource (each year enough straw to build 2 million homes is burned in the US as waste), excellent building material (3 times the fire rating as traditional 2x4 construction, and excellent earthquake performance.) Building with straw bales could improve the local economy by buying less out of state lumber and giving local farmers added income from
their agricultural waste, all while using much less energy in buildings using straw bales - which means Utah can sell more power to other states at their higher rates.
Resident
To be perfectly blunt I really know nothing of agriculture or farming in Utah or anywhere else for that matter. I am a lifetime Salt Lake City resident that believes in buying local as much as possible and as fresh as possible when it comes to food. However, the only chance I seem to get to do this on an extensive level is once a week for a few months out of the year when the Farmer's Market opens up downtown. Even then, I feel that there are many farms and local food products that I'm unable to experience. I would really like to see a comprehensive directory of all farms in Utah so that I can have some idea of what is available in my state. This would allow me to not only see options in and around Salt Lake for the times that I am home but also gives me a chance to know what's available on that next camping trip or family gathering away from the city.
