Research Identifies Energy Savings for Dairy farmers

RESEARCH IDENTIFIES ENERGY SAVINGS FOR DAIRY FARMERS

Morrisons has collaborated with leading scientists and dairy farmers to produce the UK dairy industrys first independent guide to using environmentally friendly renewable energy sources.

Experts from Newcastle University believe renewable energy forms, such as wind turbines, light energy PV  panels and anaerobic digestion, could help dairy farmers cut electricity bills by as much as 30%, a yearly saving of over 3000 on a typical dairy farm.

Renewable energy and energy efficiency options for UK dairy farms is the latest report to come from the Morrisons Farm Programme, a long term initiative with a strong research focus aimed at helping develop a sustainable British farming industry.

Research focus areas, which have the potential to offer tangible benefits, were discussed initially with members of Arla Foods Milk Partnership (AFMP) and renewable energy was a subject area identified as a priority by them.

Morrisons Head of Agriculture David Evans said: Dairy farmers told us they needed a practical, no-nonsense guide to cut through the myriad of information and advice that surrounds the whole area of renewable energy.

We believe this independent report, written specifically with the UK dairy sector in mind, has the potential to help dairy farmers make big savings on electricity costs from a fairly modest investment in the right renewable energy forms for their business.

Making the move towards renewable energy is also good news for the environment and can help the agricultural sector meet the UK Governments requirements for an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

AFMP farmer, Robert Morris-Eyton, said: Like many farmers I know that renewable energy has the potential to help me cut electricity costs, which is currently a substantial cost to my business, but what I needed was something that was independently written, could cut through the sales pitch and find the right solutions for my dairy business.

This report has answered a lot of the questions I had about energy efficiency and renewable technology and it has given me some excellent practical advice on notoriously complex areas such as grid connection.

Dr Paul Bilsborrow  from the School of Agriculture Food and Rural Development at Newcastle University who is the lead author of the report believes that the findings offer real benefit for dairy farmers both in reducing their input costs and also in helping reduce the carbon footprint of the UK dairy industry.

Morrisons is ‘The Retailer of the Year’, having secured the most highly sought after award in retail for an unprecedented second consecutive year, at the Oracle Retail Week Awards 2009. We are the UKs fourth largest food retailer with over 420 stores and our business is mainly food and grocery the weekly shop. Uniquely we source and process most of the fresh food that we sell though our own manufacturing facilities, giving us close control over provenance and quality; and we have more people preparing more food in store than any other retailer. Every week ten million customers pass through our doors and over 130,000 colleagues across the business work hard each day to deliver great service to them. With competitive prices and hundreds of special offers, we are proud to save our customers money every day.