Edge Enterprises Plans Soy Product

Chicken houses and other agricultural facilities will soon have another energy-saving insulation product at their fingertips, and BioBased Systems of Rogers will produce it. Biobased Systems’ traditional residential and commercial insulation products have now been engineered for agriculture.

Edge Enterprises Inc. of Lincoln markets and distributes the product for BioBased. The company had previously marketed a polyurethane-based, spray-foam insulation, called Ag-Tite, but will now be selling BioBased Systems’ soy-based equivalent under the Ag-Tite name.

Blue Mhoon, Dick Latta, and Bill Collins are the managing partners of Edge Enterprises Inc.

Ag-Tite will hit the retail market around Oct. 1 through animal health care distributor Wynco Animal Health Inc. of Lowell.

Collins said the insulation material costs about $1.10 per SF, or about $22,000 for a farmer with a 20,000-SF chicken house, in addition to $1,000 to $5,000 for installation. The product could save farmers an average 20 percent to 50 percent in energy costs, he said.

Collins said Edge Enterprises has done petroleum based insulation applications for thousands of chicken houses in the South over the last two years, but the soybean-based product is new.

Edge Enterprises specialized in retrofitting poultry houses with insulation that were built more than 20 years ago. The BioBase product allows opportunity beyond poultry, he said.