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Grain elevators have always lived and died by uptime. When dryers stop, grain quality suffers, bottlenecks form, and revenue evaporates by the hour. But in recent years, a new operational threat has crept into the agricultural sector: natural gas price spikes and supply curtailments. These disruptions, once rare, are now common enough that many facilities are rethinking how they secure reliable fuel for heat-intensive processes.
That’s where blended air systems come in. And the opportunities for grain elevators (and other natural gas-dependent sectors) are expanding fast.
Ensure Continuous Grain Drying
Protect your uptime by adding propane blended air systems to your elevator or grain drying facility.
Act now.
A Growing Need for Grain Drying Fuel Resilience
Natural gas allocation events used to be limited to extreme cold snaps or pipeline issues. Today, utilities are more frequently restricting supply to industrial and agricultural customers during peak demand. When that happens, grain elevators can be forced offline at the worst possible time—right in the middle of drying season.
The impact of downtime ripples through the supply chain. Elevators must delay grain intake, creating bottlenecks at receiving locations and forcing elevators to redirect deliveries to less efficient facilities to keep truck lines moving. When wet grain cannot be dried and moved efficiently, elevators may be forced to limit purchases, reject deliveries, or store grain at higher moisture levels, increasing the risk of spoilage and quality losses. Equipment shutdowns can also result in missed market opportunities, additional labor costs, and reduced customer satisfaction as farmers seek alternative delivery points.
A Better Solution for Grain Drying Natural Gas Backup
Propane has long been the fuel of choice for grain drying without access to natural gas. But even those that do have natural gas can use propane as a fallback fuel. For instance, sometimes natural gas is available, but not in the quantities needed for the startup BTU load of the unit. Then you could add an air mix system. In fact, blended air systems are becoming the go to solution for facilities that can’t afford downtime.
Blended air systems installed by Gas Equipment Company at a hospital and a dairy processor. Photos courtesy of GAC.
How Propane Blended Air Systems Work
- They combine vaporized propane with ambient air to create synthetic natural gas (SNG).
- The SNG blend matches natural gas pressure and combustion characteristics, allowing continued operation without adjustment.
- Blended air systems consist of propane supply tanks, vaporizers (direct-fired, water bath, electric, steam, or hot water), air–fuel mixers, and pump skids and controls.
- When natural gas is curtailed, the blended air system automatically takes over, and when curtailment ends, the system transitions back without interruption.
Sophisticated vaporizer configurations can help adapt blended air systems for companies with strict policies for grain dust and open flames. Todd Meyer from Gas Equipment Company, an equipment distributor based in Texas, notes:
“Most water bath systems have an enclosed burner train, eliminating the open flame concerns. If a flame is not allowed, then we would use an electric vaporizer system tied to the air mixer or blender, and with proper regulators be able to operate when the natural gas pressure dropped off. These systems would be built to handle the full load, so if it got late in the season an operator could make the easy switch to a full-on SNG system.”
Blended air systems are not unique to the grain drying industry. For instance, a milk processing plant avoided millions in potential losses by setting up propane air-mix systems ahead of a natural gas allocation event. Large commercial facilities like hospitals, data centers, and manufacturing plants can also benefit from the peace of mind that blended air systems provide. These examples mirror the challenges grain elevators face—high heat loads, narrow operating windows, and zero tolerance for downtime.
Where to Start with Propane Blended Air Systems
If your commercial or agricultural operation is concerned about the impact of peak load pricing or curtailment from utility companies, now is the time to research blended air systems.
Visit propane.com/grain-drying to learn more and connect with a local propane marketer who can help get you started.
