Welcome to Digital Kent

View Synopsis Evy Barry
What sparked Thanet Earth, what was the inspiration, what was the moment when this came into life?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
Erm well the original concept came actually came from some er from some growers overseas who recognised the value of the UK market and that UK agriculture was going into quite steep decline erm - we have planning permission for 7 greenhouses on the site. The whole site is 91 hectares, it's when you start to talk about these sorts of sizes very difficult to to to get some perspective about that. Each of the greenhouses is between 7 and 9 hectares and that's about the size of 10 football pitches.

And the plants aren't actually growing in the ground, it's what they call a hydroponic system erm and the plants sit in a plastic gutter about one metre off of the ground. That allows all of the crop and training to happen at more of a sort of waist to shoulder height - which makes it much quicker and much easier to do the work. The days are gone of bending over in a field picking cauliflowers.
Evy Barry
Why was Thanet chosen? Why did you choose Thanet?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
Erm because Thanet is the only area in south-east England that has a status for urgent regeneration erm for agriculture it's very good because it's er it has quite a temperate climate and then after that there's just some pure practicalities erm we need a national grid connection and we have the only electricity line that's going into the Thanet area coming across the site and we'll actually be tapping into that when we're generating out electricity. Erm there's been a lot of development recently in what they call CHP machines. That means combined heat and power and the government includes CHP in er as a key part of its alternative generation and basically what it is - is a large engine as you would have in a motor car but instead of running on petrol or diesel these run on gas. The engine's currently cooled via your radiator in a car - that is the heat that we'll be taking off of the engine and there's enough in there that we can actually run our greenhouses.

Evy Barry
And then what happens to the excess electricity?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
We'll be putting that onto the grid and we'll be producing enough of Thanet's - about 50% of Thanet's total needs. The rest can join the grid and go anywhere in the country. There'll be a coal fired power station somewhere in England that will have to produce slightly less because of what we are producing and there is a significant carbon footprint gain on that process as well. So it's a win win in both directions.

We get an outbreak of something like an aphid or a red spider or a caterpillar these are our biggest enemies when we are growing the plants and so we'll bring in a population of friendly ones and they will either actually physically eat them or they disturb the breeding process by feeding on the eggs and really that take the population right down and that avoids the use of pesticides.

We'll be giving water to the plants. What the plant doesn't absorb is collected in a drainage channel and goes back around the system - we correct the balance of nutrients and minerals the plant needs and then it goes back around so we have a continually turning process and that erm results in about a 25% saving on the water that we actually need to use for the crop.

Evy Barry
So what sort of jobs and how many are on offer?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
By our last calculation we believe there are over 550 jobs at the site - some of those are going to be based at the production units and then we have the large central pack and consolidation facility. We've also a training centre and what we hope is that the word will get around about the works that's going on at the site and make us an attractive employer for the Kent area.

Evy Barry
So just give me an idea of what happens from here on in?




Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
In March 2008 we will actually start the greenhouse construction and it's at that point really that people will see the whole project coming to life. Er the greenhouses go up very quickly and er from the outside will look finished probably by July er there's some equipment and fittings to do inside but we'll plant in September and we should see production coming off of the site by October 2008.

The greenhouses are glass. They are very very much like any that you will find at any sort of B&Q for your back garden just on a much much bigger scale. The columns and framework is either aluminium or steel er depending on what it's doing and glass panels but our glass panels are around one metre by two metres in size. They're huge because we are really interested in maximising the amount of light that can enter it.

Evy Barry
If you can imagine that the greenhouses have gone up and the plants are in place. You go in what do you see?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
What you see is a wall of plants. The plants will grow to a height of six metres, growing salad products - that's primarily tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers. I think what you most notice - certainly what I do is the evenness of the whole thing. The crop because it's such a controlled environment - the growers are able to grow such a consistent crop and everybody knows these days that they want their fruit and vegetables to not only taste good but look great and that's really what we can do in these houses.

Evy Barry
Have you set yourself targets for what you want to produce and what your turnover should be?

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
Really with the impact of Thanet Earth we are going to add over 15% to the total current UK production, however, that's still probably less than 5% of what we actually consume - such is the extent that we produce so little of what we actually eat now and really this is Thanet earth - is the first real project with the opportunity to reverse that trend - buck the trend.

Evy Barry
And do you expect to see copycats coming...

Steve McVickers
Managing Director Thanet Earth
Well they say that copycat is the greatest compliment you can have. Erm, I'm sure the UK could easily cope with several more Thanet earths. It's not easy to do there's a huge financial investment er we're putting in over £80 million. We welcome anyone who wants to follow in our path because that is the way Britain is going to produce more and protect its er its position in the market.