Heat and Moisture Production Rates of a Modern U.S. Swine Breeding-Gestation-Farrowing Facility

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2013-07-01
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Stinn, John
Xin, Hongwei
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Xin, Hongwei
Distinguished Professor Emeritus
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Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering
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Currently, swine building ventilation design is based on heat and moisture rates measured in the 1950s and 1970s. Advancements in genetics, nutrition and management practices to increase productivity and pork quality during this period likely have led to considerable changes in heat and moisture production rates of the animals and their housing systems. This study quantifies total heat production rate (THP), house-level moisture production rate (MP) and house-level sensible heat production rate (SHP) of a 4300-sow breeding, gestation, and farrowing facility in Iowa for 17 consecutive months. THP was determined using indirect animal calorimetry, MP was determined from mass balance, and SHP was calculated as the difference between THP and latent heat production (LHP). A Mobile Air Emission Monitoring Unit (MAEMU) was installed to monitor the deep-pit breeding-early gestation barn (1800 head), the deep-pit late gestation barn (1800 head), and two shallow-pit (pull-plug) farrowing rooms (40 head per room). This paper reports on data collected from February 2012 through the completion of the study in June 2013. Preliminary results from the study show that THP averages 373 W/sow for sows in the breeding/early gestation stage, 376 W/sow for sows in the late gestation stage, and 1191 W/sow+litter for sows and litters in the lactation stage. The house-level MP averages 198 g/hr-sow for sows in the breeding/early gestation stage, 192 g/hr-sow for sows in the late gestation stage, 818 g/hr-sow for sows and litters in the lactation stage. Finally the house-level SHP averages 223 W/sow for sows in the breeding/early gestation stage, 230 W/sow for sows in the late gestation stage, and 572 W/sow for sows and litters in the lactation stage. Compared with the ASABE standards, values from the current study for gestation sows showed increases of 55% in THP, 20% in MP, and 58% in SHP. Similarly, values for farrowing sow and litter showed increases of 85% in THP, 64% in MP, and 80% in SHP relative to the ASABE standards.

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Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 UTC 2013