Agriculture · Leeuwarden, Netherlands · 2024
A dairy farm that milks and cools on its own barn roofs
Site plan
Hoeve De Terp
Leeuwarden, Netherlands
- Solar array, 420 kWp
- Battery, 400 kWh
- Trees and planting kept
- Completed
- 2024
- Drawn by
- Lumora engineering
- System size
- 420 kWp
- Yearly generation
- 391 MWh
- Saved a year
- €68,000
- Payback
- 7.5 years
- CO₂ avoided a year
- 152 t
01The challenge
Hoeve De Terp milks 260 cows twice a day, at 05:00 and 17:00, with robots, vacuum pumps and cooling tanks that peak when the sun is low. A grid fault in winter had once put a full tank of milk at risk.
02What we built
We put panels on the south-facing halves of both barn roofs and a 400 kWh battery by the parlour. It charges through the day and covers the evening milking and the overnight cooling, and switches the cooling tanks to backup if the grid drops.
03The result
The farm now makes 391 MWh a year and covers both milkings from its own power for most of the year. The cooling tanks have ridden through two grid faults without anyone noticing.
How the project ran
Farm visit
September 2023
Barn structure, the milking schedule and the cooling tanks' backup needs.
Design
October to December 2023
South-face layouts, battery siting away from the livestock and an agricultural grant application.
Installation
February to April 2024
Barn roofs between milkings, battery on a new slab by the parlour.
Monitoring
From May 2024
An annual inspection and a winter check of the backup switch-over.
The tanks stay cold whatever the grid does. For a dairy, that matters more than the savings.
Site assessment
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