Scientists at Aberystwyth University will play a leading role in a major government-funded drive to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. As part of a UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) investment of £30 million over four-and-a-half years, researchers at Aberystwyth’s Institute for Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences (IBERS) will lead a consortium of partners to […]

In an industry first, farmers considering planting the carbon negative crop Miscanthus can now benefit from a finance package to cover virtually all upfront costs for crop establishment, as well as new direct, long-term offtake agreements with end-users, with 10–15-year index-linked annual returns. The new opportunity has been launched to help support the growing need […]

In a Terravesta guest blog, which first appeared on the UK Energy Research Centre, Miscanthus scientist, Dr Anita Shepherd discusses why Miscanthus bioenergy production needs scaling up, what can be expected in terms of yield, carbon captured and sequestered in the soil… I model projections of bioenergy crop yield and energy, carbon capture, and environmental […]

Miscanthus specialist, Terravesta, is looking for a full-stack developer to join its team to help develop and grow the new Harvest Hub platform and the existing research data management system, Physis. The successful candidate will be responsible for furthering the development of these systems, including analysis and design of new workflows and features across all […]

North Lincolnshire arable farmers, Ambrose and Edward Fowler, have been growing their Miscanthus crop for 13 years on drought-prone unproductive land, and have seen annual yield increases with no fertiliser applied over this time. “The crop yielded 13t/ha in 2020, with no other inputs apart from very occasional use of a non-selective herbicide before the […]

Terravesta welcomes Jonathan Backhouse to the team this spring, as operations manager. Key to his role is working with new growers to get Miscanthus off to the best possible start as well as supporting them through the crop’s life. Jonathan’s background is rooted in agriculture, coming from an agri-engineering family, and he has held numerous […]

On 23 February, the first biomass thermal power plant, using British agri-tech, was officially opened in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova. This occasion marked the start of the transition of the energy supply system from imported fossil gas to renewable energy. The newly-installed 150kW biomass thermal power plant is a project pilot. The project aims […]

Following on from the 2020 harvest and some of the best yields ever recorded for Miscanthus, we are all looking forward to what the 2021 harvest will yield. Thank you to all those who attended our ‘Miscanthus Growers Forum’ this month. Here we updated growers on the ‘Terravesta Harvest Hub’, our new innovative information management […]

Ahead of 2021 Miscanthus harvest, Terravesta has launched its innovative ‘Harvest Hub’ streamlined information management system to help growers to upload and access their harvest data at the click of a button. The Harvest Hub will ensure that sustainability data is captured, and in future this data will assist in grower’s carbon sequestration reporting. “It’s […]

Rob Meadley, Brown and Co agricultural business consultant and East Yorkshire arable farmer, grows 12 hectares of Miscanthus on varying quality, outlying land which previously wasn’t delivering a viable return with arable crops. His Miscanthus is coming up to eight years old and after a difficult start in April 2012 where planting was followed by […]

As I write this from Tier 3 Lockdown Lincolnshire, who would have believed that after all of the drama of last year, it would be capped by something so much more dramatic this year! 2019, floods; 2020, plague; 2021, swarms? Well, let’s hope not, but who knows what lies in store? At Terravesta our collective […]