When agriculture became mechanized and gas-powered tractors replaced animal power, that changed. Energy became an expense.
In March 1980, we went south of New Salem to Chuck Bahm’s farm, where he was demonstrating the use of sunflower oil in diesel engines. Bahm’s vision, and the vision of many at that time, was of an agricultural industry that produced food, fiber and fuel, just as had been the case when animals provided the power.
