Canadian Greenhouse Conference and Indoor Ag-Con

By Andrew Mefferd, Johnny’s Selected Seeds

October was a busy month for me, with two major, consecutive greenhouse conferences taking place mid-month — the Canadian Greenhouse Conference and the Indoor Ag-Con. They looked to be great events so I wanted to make sure and get to both of them — even if it made for a travel-packed schedule.

Canadian Greenhouse Conference at the Scotiabank Convention Center

First I went to beautiful Niagara Falls, Ontario, the week of October 5th, for the Canadian Greenhouse Conference. The Canadian greenhouse industry is highly advanced, so I knew there would be good information and vendors. The highlights included the many developments underway in the use of beneficial insects to control pests, with an informative discussion on how to identify pests and the best biocontrols to combat them without the use of harmful chemicals.

There was also a lot of talk about how to make greenhouses more efficient. In addition to hearing about the many ongoing developments in LED lighting and other technologies to increase energy efficiency, I sat in on a great presentation on a program by the Dutch government that is working towards having zero water and fertilizer emissions from greenhouses.

It is not a new idea that the ideal greenhouse would be one that produces no emissions whatsoever, and the technology is now catching up with the idea. In a country like Holland with a big greenhouse industry, reducing or even eliminating the amount of greenhouse emissions could have a big impact on improving the environment. As the technology comes on line to accomplish this, the Dutch government is tightening emissions standards to prompt growers to install newer, more efficient technology. It is exciting to see the technology being developed for cleaner greenhouses, because the Dutch tend to come up with a lot of the greenhouse innovations that end up being adopted worldwide.

Great looking produce and flowers

Other useful workshops included how to train and motivate workers, how to understand soil and water tests, and how to mix your own custom fertilizer solution. Overall, a very good conference that is worth attending for greenhouse growers.

The next week I went down to New York City for the first East Coast Indoor Ag-Con. This conference has been held three times in the past in Las Vegas, and is branching out into Asia with a conference in Singapore in January 2016, and is being held again in Las Vegas in April 2016.

If you look closely you can see that Johnny's was an event sponsor for Indoor Ag-Con!

This was a visionary conference, in that it focused on technological innovation leading the vanguard of protected agriculture. It provided a forum for those working on next-generation greenhouse technology to present their work and perspectives. Examples of topics that get a lot of attention include use of LED lighting, aquaponics, vertical greenhouses, aeroponics, and urban greenhouses.

I feel this conference gives us a glimpse into the future of indoor agriculture. Even if all of the innovations don’t become commonplace, chances are some of the new technologies being discussed will become standards in the future. The conference sold out, so maybe they will consider a multi-day format on the East Coast as they have in the past the West. Overall, it was a very informative and inspiring conference.

Indoor Ag-Con in NYC

Both conferences got me excited about the potential for improving protected agriculture, though they did make for a very busy October! Visit our Grower’s Library, where you can read more about attracting and putting beneficial insects to work; as well as controlled environment agriculture, including Johnny’s greenhouse trialing program, what to look for when choosing which varieties to grow under protected culture, and recent advances in protected culture crop production.

Visit to Whitewater Gardens’ Geoexchange Greenhouse in Altura, Minnesota

By Andrew Mefferd, Johnny's Selected Seeds

DAY 1 — Whitewater Gardens’ Geoexchange Greenhouse, Altura, Minnesota

Earlier this year, I flew out to La Crosse, Wisconsin to attend the Midwest Organic & Sustainable Education Services (MOSES) annual conference. On the way in to the conference, I stopped by to visit with Sandy Dietz at Whitewater Gardens Farm in Altura, Minnesota.

I was interested to see the farm because they are incorporating a number of cutting-edge greenhouse techniques in order to grow vegetables in short-season Minnesota as efficiently as possible.

While they have several other greenhouses plus areas for field production (all under a blanket of snow at the time), what I was really there to see this visit was their brand new 46'x126' geothermally heated greenhouse.

Altura, MN in Winona County

This greenhouse represents the wave of the future when it comes to energy efficiency. The entire perimeter of the greenhouse is protected by a frost wall extending 4' down into the ground. This wall minimizes the amount of cold that penetrates through to the greenhouse, a worthwhile measure for reasons that were obvious on the freezing day that I visited. Insulation laid 4' down under the floor further reduces the amount of cold that seeps through the ground into the greenhouse.

One of the most unusual features of this greenhouse is that geothermal energy is the primary source of fuel for its heating system. Ground-loop geothermal heating is a technology that takes heat from the earth and builds it up to usable levels with a heat pump (also known as a ground source heat pump, or GSHP). The water is heated and then circulated through tubes in the floor, which literally heats the greenhouse from the ground up.

(Equally notable is that geoexchange technology allows for excess heat to be transferred back into the ground — or, for cold air to be pumped to a cold-storage area, for example — as well as for heating.)

When more heat is necessary than the geothermal can provide, a forced-air propane backup system kicks in to make up the difference. What I will be interested to learn after a few seasons of operation is what proportion of the required heating the geothermal can provide versus how much the propane backup system will have to supply.

Whitewater Geothermal Greenhouse

To date, there are very few geothermal greenhouse systems in the United States. But based on the fact that energy is the second-largest cost for many greenhouse growers after labor, I would be surprised if we don’t see more growers following the Whitewater Gardens lead.

Another innovation Dietz is pursuing is to install Solawrap greenhouse covering this spring. Most heated greenhouses using flexible plastic coverings have two layers of plastic inflated by a small fan. The air between the layers of plastic provides a layer of insulation, greatly increasing the heat-trapping properties beyond a single layer of plastic.

Instead of using a fan to inflate the layers of plastic, Solawrap uses two layers of plastic with bubbles in between to form the insulative layer. It looks like a giant sheet of bubble wrap. The advantage is that it maintains the air layer, without having to constantly run a fan to keep it inflated. The product is from Europe and not widely used in the US at this point.

I look forward to checking back in with Sandy in the future to see how all these innovations are working out on her farm. I really enjoyed the visit and am always impressed with the things I can learn about from our customers.

Learn more...

• For more details on SolaWrap: Eliot Coleman’s blog post on New Concepts for Winter Growing »
• Controlled Environment Agriculture : Dramatic Changes to Greenhouse Crop Production, by Merle Jensen, PhD »
• Johnny’s Winter Growing Guide »
• Geothermal Exchange Organization »
• Slideshow: Whitewater Gardens Geothermal Greenhouse »
  
  

Check back for our next blog entry —
Day 2 of Andrew's Trip to Michigan & Minnesota