ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service

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ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service
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ATTRA Question of the Week

What are some resources for energy audit tools and checksheets?

L.M.
Indiana

Answer: The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has contracted with GDS Associates to create about 13 energy self-assessment tools for farms. They can be found at http://144.92.31.19/.

These calculators are still undergoing some revisions, but they are well done, under the supervision of Scott Sanford at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They will eventually appear on the NRCS websites and I would expect them to become well-known and even standard.

Companies like EnSave have their own tools and checklists, but these tend to be proprietary.

Our publication "Farm Energy Calculators: Tools for Saving Money on the Farm" provides links to a couple dozen other calculators.

This kind of information is somewhat scattered and inconsistent, and there are important regional variations. But I hope these will be some helpful starting points.

Posted: December 1, 2008

About the Question of the Week

Each "Question of the Week" is an actual research query submitted by a farmer or rancher and answered by an Agriculture Specialist from the USDA-funded ATTRA program, managed by the National Center for Appropriate Technology.

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ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service is managed by the National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT) and is funded under a grant from the United States Department of Agriculture's Rural Business-Cooperative Service. Visit the NCAT Web site for more information on our sustainable agriculture projects.

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