Solar-Powered Produce Meets Workforce Development
When South Carolina-based renewable energy developer Solar United National (SUN) was contacted by a USDA plant research facility, the company’s founders didn’t expect it would trigger a CEA subsidiary. But that’s exactly what took place.
The SUN team got their first introduction to controlled environment agriculture in the form of 19 shipping container farms at the USDA’s Charleston research facility. Led by Kai-Shu Ling, Ph.D., the research team was considering a solar microgrid. SUN responded with a Request for Proposal (RFP) design.
“They have 18 containers that research is being done on right now. And at any time, there’s a million dollars’ worth of research in there,” SUN cofounder Grant Scheffer explained. “If a hurricane comes, they would lose that research. So they need a way for continuity and resilience to be built into that facility.”
For SUN cofounders Scheffer, Drew Harris, and Brad Leon — whose diverse backgrounds span clean energy, real estate, and Department of Defense contracting — the experience was eye-opening.
SUN launched in 2023 with a driving mission of community involvement and workforce development, tied to renewable energy sources.
“Once we saw these containers and saw what they could mean for rural communities, hosted alongside our community solar work, as an economic driver for communities? That was where we really started saying, okay, if you offset the high energy costs, and you connect it to community solar, you can bring in a real economic driver to a rural community,” Scheffer said.
Not long after, SunAg Farms was launched as a wholly owned SUN subsidiary, with the concept of solar-powered container farm CEA production at its core.
SUN and SunAg Co-Founders Brad Leon, Drew Harris and Grant Scheffer | Photo: SunAg
Proof of Concept and Profitability
The SUN team’s vision for making a difference in rural and disadvantaged communities with solar-powered CEA is highly dependent on the farms’ success in the communities SUN hopes to serve.
“SunAg is our avenue of proving the efficacy of the model so that when we bring it into a community, we know how the farm runs, we know how to create the workforce development piece, so that the farms can be run very effectively and they can be managed by bringing folks in from the community,” Scheffer said.
In a region that’s seen traditional agriculture hard hit by saltwater intrusion — a challenge also being addressed by a Clemson University-led CEA research team — Harris added that loss of a single crop can be devastating for farmers. But container farms and community solar open new revenue streams and career paths.
With the help of local nonprofits, city governments, and federal funding, the SUN team hopes to train new solar-powered CEA farmers and new nationally certified solar installers, thereby creating two new economic pathways for small, disadvantaged communities. “That is the key to what SUN is trying to do nationally,” Scheffer said.
While federal funding figures heavily in the company’s broader plans, their proof-of-concept CEA farming enterprise doesn’t count on outside funding or nonprofit support.
“We’re proving the model on a break-even, profit-based standpoint,” Harris said. “But the reality is, by proving the model and that standpoint, we’re also enabling the communities to do the same thing on a nonprofit standpoint, so they can provide fresh produce to their community that did not have access to this quantity in the past.”
The team emphasizes they’re not presenting themselves as having all the solutions to a community’s problems. Scheffer noted, “What we’re really trying to show is that we have put our money where our mouth is to prove that this model works before we bring it, and that is the reason why we decided to take the opportunity to farm the containers ourselves.”
Trays in a SunAg Propagation Container | Photo: SunAg
SunAg’s CEA Production
In April, SunAg Farms launched in three container farms — two nutrient film technique (NFT) production units and one propagation unit. As they await their move to a permanent location, the company operates on the campus of AmplifiedAg, the ag technology company behind the Charleston USDA’s research container farms.
Scheffer explained that space and transformer capacity are the biggest limits to production now. Their permanent facility will launch with three production containers, which they expect will produce about 3,600 heads of lettuce a week. But until then, they’re content to run smaller.
“That’s a limitation, but it was by design. AmplifiedAg gave us this accelerated runway to be able to get up and running while we applied for the USDA loan to get the land and the containers on site,” Scheffer said. Being in production also made their loan application stronger and will shorten the learning curve when the permanent move comes.
Harris, whose past experience includes restaurant ownership, has leveraged connections to bring in expertise. From farmers to salespeople and delivery drivers, a commercial CEA operation is in full swing. And the SUN team is getting their hands dirty, learning how to operate a CEA produce farm successfully.
“We need to have that experience to show [communities] as well. This is an involved process,” Harris said.
He added that AmplifiedAg, who provides extended support to their customers, has been the ideal shoulder to lean on: “Their team has grown over 10 million heads of lettuce. Why try and recreate the wheel when you’ve got the masters in your house?”
Vision for the Future of SunAg
For the time being, SunAg’s founders are focused on South Carolina and the benefits that community solar, solar installation training, and CEA container farm production can bring to rural and disadvantaged communities throughout the state. Their immediate goal is to set up 10 training/farming centers there. But those centers will serve as a model for national expansion.
Scheffer and Harris readily admit their vision for solar-powered produce and workforce development transcends their home state and even the USA.
“As microgrid designers, our forte is being able to drop containers anywhere and not be grid-reliant,” Scheffer said. “… Our vision is that you can effectively bring in the containers, the solar, a constant water supply — you don’t need a lot of water, as you know, you can tank water in — and the human know-how. And within three months, be producing healthy food for a population.”
Commenting on the world’s displaced populations, Scheffer added, “It’s just incredible to me that we are not doing more of this.”
While CEA’s potential to positively impact human welfare is persuasive, Harris underscored that running a container farm operation is still a business that requires due diligence and dedication.
“Anytime you start a business, especially something with a variable product like produce or something where you’re relying upon the human element — not just for the production but also for the sales and for the sustainability — you really have to dive into it,” Harris said. “You really need to research your local market, the energy costs especially.”
Different municipalities have very different energy costs and energy access. The marriage of solar power and CEA container farms may provide an avenue for independent farmers to take control of those costs and set their own course for success.