The facility includes an educational building with a classroom, an analytical lab, a warehouse and a pilot feed mill; a 100-foot concrete mill tower; a 40-foot concrete pelleting plant; and 200,000 bushels of grain storage.
The complex is located on 10 acres of university-owned land in Ames, Iowa, US, that had been the site of crop research, seed operations and crop yield performance trials for more than 50 years.
A 30-year industry veteran, Anthony Ewing, right, is associate director and operations manager for the facility, and Dirk Maier, left, is director of the complex and professor of grain and feed operations and processing at Iowa State University.
Each bin has a capacity of about 45,000 bushels, with two different aeration systems so comparisons can be made for research purposes.
In addition to the four storage bins, the facility has one (bottom left) 20,000-bushel bin set up as an in-bin drying system and two 10,000-bushel wet holding bins (middle right).
The mixed flow dryer was donated by Sukup, based in Sheffield, Iowa, US.
The facility has a central vacuum system that was donated by Walinga.
The 10-tph hammermill was donated by CPM, based in Waterloo, Iowa, US.
CPM also donated the three-high roller mill, which has a capacity of 10 tph.
CPM, which acquired Bliss Industries in 2021, donated a high-efficiency pellet cooler to the facility.
The feed mill has parallel conditioning systems including a conditioner with a retentioner that can hold feed at temperature for a longer time and bypass the pellet mill to produce heat treated mash.
Monitoring systems, donated by AGI SureTrack, are installed throughout the facility.
Here’s a look at the Iowa State University Kent Feed Mill and Grain Science Complex, a $30 million educational and research facility that was made possible with financial support and equipment donations from grain and feed industry suppliers, state crop groups and feed manufacturers.
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KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI, US — It was a bumpy ride for the global grain industry in 2024.
An already unstable geopolitical situation worsened with military conflicts expanding in Ukraine and the Middle East. Transporting grain efficiently was a challenge, in part because of those wars. And several of the world’s largest agribusiness companies saw profits tumble in a suboptimal economic climate for global agriculture.
The establishment in both Europe and the United States saw a conservative backlash against their liberal policies, leading to political unrest in countries such as France and the return of Donald Trump to the US presidency after a four-year absence. The result will likely be a continued trend toward protectionist policies that will impact the global grain trade in the coming years as well a reduced emphasis on “green” environmental policies that had become prevalent during the past four years.
The following are World Grain’s top 10 stories for 2024.
KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI, US — These are the 12 nations at which World Grain took an in-depth look through its monthly Country Focus series in 2024. Revisit the locations and the perspective they provide on global grain, flour and feed issues: