The P¨¤mies families has been working the land for generations, with the primary goal of providing society with top-quality farm products. Miquel and Josep P¨¤mies have innovated their production methods and product offerings over the course of their professional career, employing up to 15 workers during production peaks on their seven acres of farmland. 

In 2002, the company built its current industrial warehouse as part of an upgrading of its farming infrastructure. The building houses management and offices, reception, cleaning, boxing and packaging of fresh agricultural products, cold storage in refrigerating chambers and order processing. These days it also has a space with a farmer's market selling their products, a selection of plants for infusions and nutritional supplements for managing one's health. Along with the production and sale of live medicinal plants in the warehouse, this represents the core of the last decade of innovating the company's services. This activity formed the spark that led to the creation of the Balaguer-based Dulce Revoluci¨®n de las Plantas Medicinales, which uses the company's installations to carry out part of its work.

In recent years, Miquel and Josep P¨¤mies have been noted for their social activism, fighting agrochemical use and the implementation of transgenic crops head-on. And the two men have shown great interest and have taken action in the area of renewable energies, which is why they invested in a pioneering solar dryer for medicinal plants with 10 kW of power, followed by a second unit with 35 kW designed by Ricard Guiu and purchased recently. It is one of the few state enterprises to use a solar dryer, resulting in significant energy savings and reduced emissions. These savings are realised during the eight-month production season for medicinal plants.

Managing its electrical energy consumption for cold facilities, industrial warehouse activities and pumping systems for irrigation water on farms, paired with special limitations on the electrical supply mains, is what gave the P¨¤mies family the initial idea of installing a photovoltaic generator, and later investing in and implementing technical improvements to the energy supply. These improvements were made for safety's sake for safety and also as a social investment in supporting the expansion of solar energy. The company also plays a significant role in providing training on managing one's own health and aquaculture design, offering tours, knowledge exchange and educational workshops.

A photovoltaic installation project designed by the AdeInnova engineering company has been on death row since 2011 waiting for the technical and economic guarantees to ensure the project's viability. Two years of monitoring the overall electricity consumption and the subsequent report revealed the technical soundness of having a photovoltaic solar generator of between 10 and 20 kWp. The requirements in place prior to 2013 for installing a connection point in solar photovoltaic self-consumption installations complicated the decision, putting it on standby until engineering firm AdeInnova and the team of installers from the Coeco cooperative informed them of a new technical legal framework backed by the Catalonia Government's Ministry of Industry. This allowed installations to forego the connection point as long as they included technology to limit injection to the distribution lines. For this project, the technology was provided by CIRCUTOR's dynamic power control unit (DPC).

Project

In May 2014, Adelnnova was hired and the updated photovoltaic self-consumption project presented and analysed. Based on this, an investment decision was made with the goal of bringing down the electricity bill, almost completely eliminating the use of the back-up diesel generator (used to compensate deficiencies in the supply network and consumption peaks), improving the quality of the energy service and resulting in fewer sanctions for exceeding the contracted power (25 kW), which often occurs at moments of solar activity during the day, due to intense use of cold storage chambers and irrigation programming.

P¨¤mies Horticoles SL is the developer on the project and selected the 15.8 kWp instantaneous self-consumption kit equipped with comprehensive and guaranteed control technology and zero injection into the distribution lines: the DPC unit from CIRCUTOR. The kit includes:

The installation was begun by the Coeco cooperative on 29 July 2014 and at this time the last of the 66 PV panels are being placed.

Work continues on preparing the site for the inverters and the box containing the instruments and analyzers. Given the intended social value of the installation, and that general mains connection is 145 metres from the most publicly visible spot, the company has earmarked an additional €1,500 to make it possible. The main control and transformation elements will have an informational panel and images of the installation. Moreover, a monitoring unit will be installed by Adelnnova so that the installation's production status, and data collection and storage can be followed online.

Technical and economic objectives

• 580,000 kWh energy package with a fixed cost of €0.045/kWh for 25 years
• Return on investment from the outset
• Unit cost for "turnkey" installation of €1.60/Wp
• Minimal maintenance cost
• Fewer sanctions for exceeding the contracted power
• Fewer diesel generator hours to provide back-up during consumption peaks

Social goals

• 100% of electrical energy consumed is clean and green.
• Social responsibility to the environment.
• Communication of overall installation data to the visiting public (8,000 visits/year)
• The installation shall be used for training and communication techniques
• Promoting the sector's industries to encourage investment in solar installations
• Supporting the solar economy, organisations and small businesses in the sector