At Westland Plant in Kwintsheul, no less than 2500 m2 of solar panels have been installed. The installation is special because the panels are integrated into the glass so that light still enters the processing area. It is currently being connected, and from now on, Peet Zwinkels hopes to be self-sufficient for most of the year as far as the company's energy needs are concerned.
The polycarbonate plates on the barn were in need of replacement, says Peet, and because of the desire and need felt to make the business more sustainable, further consideration was given to more than simply new plates. "I got in touch with TST, and it turned out to be quite possible to fit solar panels integrated into glass, which also fitted into the existing rebates. That made the investment interesting. We hope to produce 400,000 kWh on an annual basis soon."
Currently, Peet cannot feed back to the grid (because it's full). He is therefore looking at options to store the generated power, and there are two ways to do this. "We could turn it into heat and buffer that, but that doesn't make sense in our case, especially since we already get our heat from the local geothermal source. I'm actually thinking mainly about batteries. Then we can store power during the day and use it again in the off-peak hours."
Apart from providing energy, of course, the panels should also provide a slightly cooler workplace in summer. Although they logically trap light, it is still light inside as well; in clear weather, you can work there just fine without additional lighting. From the top, the cells are black, but on the inside, they are finished with a white foil, which also makes it look light inside. Assembly was taken care of from A to Z by TST.
A technician from TST is working on the connection. No less than 15K cables will be used for the whole thing.
Westland Plant has long been a major player in Spathiphyllum. On an area of 6 ha, the plants are grown fully automatically, no one works in the greenhouse. Cultivation is completely organic, the plants find their way to customers throughout Europe and are sold in large majority under the Air So Pure label.
For more information:
Peet Zwinkels
Westland Plant 
Hoenderparklaan 137-B
2295 ND, Kwintsheul
[email protected]
www.airsopure.nl