Energy Management Brings Sustainability and Savings to Suttons Farm

Output power, storage capacity, and generation all optimised and tailored to the farm’s requirements using Wattstor’s energy management system, Podium

About Suttons Farm 

Suttons Farm consists of numerous buildings for both agricultural and residential use. Whilst the forward-thinking site owner was making a significant investment in decarbonised heating, the daily import was in excess of 100 kWh, until Wattstor implemented it’s unique energy management system and battery energy storage solution.

The Challenge 

The 3 phase site supply has an Economy 7 tariff, which allows the site to benefit from electricity at just 8p per unit overnight. However, the daytime remained the highest consumption period, and the highest cost. Daily spend on electricity was becoming an increasingly good opportunity for optimisation.

The Suttons Farm site, a combination of agricultural/processing buildings and residential

The Wattstor Solution 

Wattstor’s Energy Management System, Podium, was installed at Suttons Farm ahead of any other assets. 

This allowed us to monitor the consumption of power at sub-distribution board level with exceptional accuracy. With this real and accurate data, Wattstor were able to specify an integrated solar storage system in which output power, storage capacity and generation could each be separately tailored to the farm’s requirements. 

A single piece 3-phase inverter/charger was sized to match the maximum power demand of the site, which ensured a future-proof solution and DC solar PV could be added piecemeal to the system as different roofs were developed, without requiring their own G99 applications. The vision is that a total of 60kWp of solar PV will be added over a number of months, with each array commissioned as they go. 

A 108 kWh Pylontech battery is also managed on the closed-loop system, providing storage suitable to the site’s daily import, minus direct solar consumption. In the summer this will capture excess generation for use at night. Through the winter, off peak tariff electricity will be used to fill the battery at nighttime, and used in place of daytime import. 

Podium forms a closed loop controller for the battery system, accurately matching inverter output with the demand for power on site. The nature of the system means that in future the site can also integrate thermal storage into the energy management scheme, activating heat pumps when the battery is full. 

The Pylontech battery system and Refu solar inverter controlled by Wattstor’s intelligent EMS, Podium