¿Cómo mapear el tipo de columna Intervalo de PostgreSQL en Hibernate?

Esta es una solución funcional para JPA, Hibernate (con anotaciones).

Este es el comienzo de la clase de entidad (para la tabla que tiene la columna Intervalo):

@Entity
@Table(name="table_with_interval_col")
@TypeDef(name="interval", typeClass = Interval.class)
public class TableWithIntervalCol implements Serializable {

Esta es la columna de intervalo:

@Column(name = "interval_col",  nullable = false)
@Type(type = "interval")    
private Integer intervalCol;

Y esta es la clase Intervalo:

package foo.bar.hibernate.type;

import java.io.Serializable;
import java.sql.PreparedStatement;
import java.sql.ResultSet;
import java.sql.SQLException;
import java.sql.Types;
import java.util.Date;

import org.hibernate.HibernateException;
import org.hibernate.usertype.UserType;
import org.postgresql.util.PGInterval;


/**
 * Postgres Interval type
 * 
 * @author bpgergo
 * 
 */
public class Interval implements UserType {
    private static final int[] SQL_TYPES = { Types.OTHER };

    @Override
    public int[] sqlTypes() {
        return SQL_TYPES;
    }

    @SuppressWarnings("rawtypes")
    @Override
    public Class returnedClass() {
        return Integer.class;
    }

    @Override
    public boolean equals(Object x, Object y) throws HibernateException {
        return x.equals(y);
    }

    @Override
    public int hashCode(Object x) throws HibernateException {
        return x.hashCode();
    }

    @Override
    public Object nullSafeGet(ResultSet rs, String[] names, Object owner)
            throws HibernateException, SQLException {
        String interval = rs.getString(names[0]);
        if (rs.wasNull() || interval == null) {
            return null;
        }
        PGInterval pgInterval = new PGInterval(interval);
        Date epoch = new Date(0l);
        pgInterval.add(epoch);
        return Integer.valueOf((int)epoch.getTime() / 1000);
    }

    public static String getInterval(int value){
        return new PGInterval(0, 0, 0, 0, 0, value).getValue();
    }


    @Override
    public void nullSafeSet(PreparedStatement st, Object value, int index)
            throws HibernateException, SQLException {
        if (value == null) {
            st.setNull(index, Types.VARCHAR);
        } else {
            //this http://postgresql.1045698.n5.nabble.com/Inserting-Information-in-PostgreSQL-interval-td2175203.html#a2175205
            st.setObject(index, getInterval(((Integer) value).intValue()), Types.OTHER);
        }
    }

    @Override
    public Object deepCopy(Object value) throws HibernateException {
        return value;
    }

    @Override
    public boolean isMutable() {
        return false;
    }

    @Override
    public Serializable disassemble(Object value) throws HibernateException {
        return (Serializable) value;
    }

    @Override
    public Object assemble(Serializable cached, Object owner)
            throws HibernateException {
        return cached;
    }

    @Override
    public Object replace(Object original, Object target, Object owner)
            throws HibernateException {
        return original;
    }

}