If you’re a regular at the farm, you might have spotted solar panels going up onto the packing shed roof in the Market Garden. We’ve been working on this idea for quite a while, and it feels great to see them finally installed.

The panels should supply all our power needs for our market garden food production, distribution, volunteering, events and the co-op office. They are already working and we’re excited about the benefits for our community.

Lower Bills, Lower Emissions

The panels will reduce the farm’s emissions and cut energy costs. We can now power our market garden operations with our own renewable energy. From heating, to refrigeration, to the electric van, everything that plugs in is now powered by the panels. This makes the project more resilient. It cuts the high energy bills we’ve all been facing over the last few years.

Benefits Shared with the Wider Community

The panels will help us keep food prices down for households in poverty. They leave more funds available for our community and wildlife work. They make the carbon footprint of our produce extra low. This means, when you buy veg from the farm, you’re also reducing your own carbon footprint.

Also, sometimes the solar panels will produce more energy than we need. This will go into the grid, putting more renewables into the energy mix.

This is an example of what a difference a small community-based energy project can make.

Agroecology & Climate Change

In agroecology, we understand farms are part of the living world. This means tackling the climate and nature emergency head on. Agroecological farms cut emissions to slow down climate change, and build up the ecosystem as much as possible to face the changes that are coming.

Local Energy Scotland

We purchased the solar panels with support from the Scottish Government’s Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES).  Local Energy Scotland delivers the Scottish Government’s Community and Renewable Energy Scheme (CARES). CARES supports communities to engage with, participate in and benefit from the transition to net zero emissions. They were installed by South Scotland Solar Ltd.

If you’re interested in what we did, or how we did it, please contact us – we’re happy to share.

The Technical Details

For those of you who would like the technical details, here they are…

On the pack shed, we have 32 solar photovoltaic 520W panels

These are connected to a Growatt 10kW hybrid inverter, and a Growatt 10kW Single Phase LV Hybrid 15kWh battery storage system allows us to store excess energy from sunny days, so that we can use the solar generated energy at night too

Total installed capacity: 16.32 kW
Estimated annual generation: 15,128 kW