During the open house, NEW employees showed guests how computer technology allows the highly-efficient mill to produce 80 tons of feed per hour.

By Darcy Dougherty Maulsby/Farm News staff writer

Lidderdale-By the time NEW Cooperative hosted the grand opening of its new $4.5 million Lidderdale feed mill on the afternoon of May 27, employees had already filled the first truckload of feed from the facility earlier that day.

“Our customers in this part of the country are growing, and we need to grow with them,” said Elwyn Bruhl, feed manager. “We really appreciate the opportunity to come in here and build this premiere facility, and we’ve already received a lot of inquiries from new customers””

Nearly 300 people toured the feed mill, which will serve swine producers within a 50-mile radius of Lidderdale.

Of NEW’s other feed mills in Duncombe, Palmer and Bode, the Lidderdale facility is the most highly automated and will be operated by four employees, Bruhl said. In addition to the mill, NEW has also installed a corn storage tank that will supply the facility.”

Inadequate levels of quality milling capacity in the area prompted NEW to undertake the feed mill project.

“Lidderdale offered the best location for the new mill, because there’s a good corn inventory in the region and there are excellent hard-surface roads in the area,” said Bruhl, who noted the Lidderdale location became part of NEW Cooperative several years ago.

Construction began in late July 2009 on the Lidderdale facility, which was built by Younglove Construction LLC from Sioux City.

“The harsh winter was a challenge,” said Jared Myers, project manager with Younglove Construction. “Luckily we had the structure up by October, and this allowed us to keep working on the inside of the feed mill.”

The 160-foot tall mill is an engineering accomplishment, Myers noted, which includes:

• 1,600 cubic yards of concrete.

• 140 tons of reinforcing steel.

• 100 tons of structural steel.

• 3,250 linear feet of auger cast piling-16-inch diameter.

• 50 pilings, each 65 feet deep.

• 87,770 feet of wire, about 16.6 miles.

• 9,875 feet of conduit, about 1.9 miles.

• 17 ingredient bins.

• 9 loadout bins.

In addition to a computerized batching system that allows the highly-efficient mill to produce 80 tons of feed per hour, the facility includes a major scale for corn, soybean meal and distiller’s dried grains, and a minor scale for salt, calcium and more.

In addition, the mill utilizes a 24-bin microsystem for dry amino acids, minerals and pre-mixes. The mill also has the capability for a dry-mix system plus liquid.

The new mill isn’t the only new facility at the Lidderdale location. In 2008, the company added two new bins that can each hold 365,000 bushels of grain, and a third bin of the same size was constructed in 2009. NEW also built a new seed warehouse recently.

“We want to maintain a strong market for local corn and soybean producers,” Bruhl said. “Carroll County and surrounding areas put a value on livestock production and we want to support them by providing a quality feed product that’s produced efficiently in the most cost-effective way.”

You can contact Darcy Dougherty Maulsby by e-mail at yettergirl@yahoo.com.