A new project is seeking to identify sites in the region where excess heat and renewable power could be used to heat greenhouses and power vertical farms.
Farmers with anaerobic digester (AD) plants or who are running other enterprises that produce waste heat are now being encouraged to divert resources into horticultural production. Farmers may be able to gain new income streams from the sale of the waste heat and renewable power to other growers or could choose to develop horticultural projects in their own right.
The project, funded by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), is being run by a company called District Eating in conjunction with the Midlands Energy Hub. It aims to map potential sites for low carbon horticulture across the Midlands Energy Hub area, which stretches from Norfolk to Herefordshire, to identify sites that could be used to develop new low carbon horticulture projects.
This would be either with farmers and waste heat producers looking to diversify, or to help existing growers expand onto new sites, creating an income for heat and power producers, and displacing high gas and power costs for growers.
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