Listen: time for more radical thinking on renewable energy – Pearson

It’s time for farmers to explore opportunities in renewable energy as a means of farm diversification. This was the clear message from the Energy in Agriculture conference, which was held in Gurteen this week.

The event saw farmers and the renewable energy industry meet in Gurteen to explore potential opportunities in farm-scale renewable energy generation and consumption.

Speaking to college principal Mike Pearson, he noted that numbers were up on last year and there was a feeling of optimism in the air. Since last year’s event, the Support Scheme for Renewable Heat has been launched, a long-awaited incentive to kickstart the renewable heat sector.

However, he noted that there was still some frustration in the air at the event, given the slow pace of developments in the sector.

“I think there’s still an amount of frustration among farmers that things aren’t moving quickly enough,” he explained.

Opportunities

Pearson stated that now is the time for farmers to explore diversification options into renewable energy and that the industry needs to be more radical in its thinking towards renewables. "Farmers have to realise that the traditional model of growing grass to feed to animals might not be sustainable," he said.

"Maybe we do need a small reduction in some of these to help with the price increase," he continued, explaining that it could potentially be more profitable to grow grass for an anaerobic digester.

“Ireland has a wonderful land base so let’s utilise it to do something profitable for farmers,” he concluded.

Listen to the full interview here

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Farmers urged to be part of the climate solution