Agriculture & Horticulture
GridDuck measures and automates hundreds of appliances in businesses, including on farms. Contact us to learn more.
Why Energy Matters
In 2019, 7% of the UK’s energy consumption came from agriculture, totalling 1,505 ktoe (kilotonnes of crude oil equivalent). This figure is over double the European average for this same year, which totalled 3.3%.
In 2022, we’ve seen energy prices rise significantly. Surging wholesale gas and electricity prices are likely to create significant increases for businesses, especially as several business contracts will come to an end in April, June and October 2022. New rates are likely to reflect growing wholesale prices and for energy-intensive SME’s such as farms, this could prove very challenging.
Energy Breakdown
Energy use greatly depends on the type of farm.
For example, for arable farms, cooled crop storage and cultivation are the greatest consumers of energy. Dairy farms spend up to 25% of their energy on milk cooling and up to 20% on milking and lights.
On livestock, pig, and poultry farms forage production and silage are the most energy-intensive activities, followed by ventilation, feeder machinery, and lights.
Save Costs Automatically, Every Day
Do you know how much you are spending on energy? Do you know what you are spending it on, and when?
GridDuck can track your electricity consumption in real-time, for your whole building, or for individual appliances. We can also take in external data feeds to our dashboard, for example from your gas or water measurements.
Seeing as most farms operate across large sites, gaining real-time consumption visibility for maintenance, safety management and consumption data across different buildings -including accommodation- is especially valuable in this sector. Using our system, you will be able to automatically switch off high-consuming appliances and machinery.
Remote alerts and control through our mobile app is another key benefit for farm workers.
To learn more about how your farm can save energy and become more sustainable, check out our blog article: 5 Ways to Make Your Farm More Energy Efficient and Save Money.
Strawberry Farm
We helped a fruit farm keep track of electric heating in the caravans for fruit pickers.
The farm manager gets a weekly alert of the caravans that have consumed more than 185kWh.
A farm made savings of 56% with GridDuck
Automation Example
You can set simple and flexible time switch rules for lights, heaters, water heaters, and other appliances, using our simple interface. This rule is for a room heater.
Once implemented, the consumption chart for the room heater shows there are some clear savings.
An Agriculture Testimonial:
"We have installed GridDuck on several of our fruit and poultry sites, and as a result we can easily monitor, manage and analyse our energy usage.
With rising energy costs and increased pressure from supermarkets, staying on top of our energy consumption is more crucial than ever. Gridduck provides the platform to help us do that."
Alun Howard, CFO at E C Drummond
See it working in real time.
Have a look at a real example, our own office, to see how the GridDuck dashboard works and can benefit you.
See electricity demand and consumption in real time.
Understand how you can generate automation rules, create groups and set permissions.
Latest Resources:
Blog Articles
Caps Versus Usage Cuts: How to Make the Most of Energy Saving as a Farm, Factory or Hotel
5 Ways to Make Your Farm More Energy Efficient and Save Money
Free Tools
Case Studies