The University of Saskatchewan and the Prairie Agricultural Machinery Institute are working on an odour free solution for handling manure.

A demonstration using feedlot manure was held on U of S farmland to show how the bagged composting system works.

The manure is loaded into a machine, which is self-propelled, and attached to a 200 foot long bag. as the bag fills the machine can be moved forward.

The manure is pushed into the 5 foot diameter bag. With the right equipment, producers can move up to 3 tons of manure a minute through the machine, or one hundred and 80 tons an hour.

The bag is equipped with air vents and a fan to keep the material inside porous as it composts.

Phil Leduc is a senior manager at PAMI.

He says the composting process will work for any kind of manure including hog manure which is very wet.

He says, in that case, producers would have to blend it with straw. 

He says composting manure is an economical option for producers because it reduces the volume and weight of manure by about half.

So a large feedlot wouldn't have to move so much manure to the field and work it all in.

He says currently the composting system is not used very much on North American farms but it's an option farmers might want to consider. 

He says there's only one system operating in Canada, in B.C. and there are a couple in the U.S. 

However, it is very popular in Europe where the population density is much higher.

The prairie Agricultural machinery institute, in partnership with the U of S, Western Economic Diversification Canada, the Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources Canada will use the system in a solids content anaerobic digester project which will help researchers who are looking into the economic feasibility of producing sustainable energy sources from waste material.