Medeiros and Son Dairy used to pay more than $20,000 each month for electricity at their 2,450-cow dairy, but now a 1.1-megawatt solar array installation is providing 80 percent of their electrical needs. Projections are for lifetime energy savings totalling $7.5 million.

Brian Medeiros, farmer and president of sustainable business development for the dairy, selected CalCom Solar because we do not use subcontractors and were willing to work closely with him to meet the unique goals of his operation.

Irrigation and cooling, as well as milking, are the components of the farm that utilize the highest percentage of electricity. The cows have to be milked no matter what, but the potential to increase the use of fans for cow cooling and enhance productivity without generating large electricity bills is an important aspect of the solar array’s cost-effectiveness.

“What [solar] has done is allowed us to be able to invest a little bit more money into the cooling process,” says Brian Medeiros. “We’re already starting to turn cooling fans on for the cows sooner and ensure that we can do a better job at keeping our cows cool and comfortable.”

To read the entire article, including operational details and how CalCom Solar optimized the installation for the needs of the Medeiros dairy operations, please visit Progressive Dairyman.