Efficient Way to Have a Heated Greenhouse in Winter
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- Опубликовано: 27 ноя 2024
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Since the world food security situation has become more and more unstable, I have decided to try and extend my growing season into the cold winter months. Here are the items I used to attain efficient greenhouse heating.
Links:
BluetoothThermometer: amzn.to/3bsmaJy
Palram Greenhouse: amzn.to/39GF8I6
Immersion Heaters: amzn.to/3xo3F1p
Thermostat: amzn.to/3oZHE2C
Water Barrels: amzn.to/3sBeXuZ
#greenhouseheating
Special Thanks:
Videezy.com
With a possible shift in global food security, I decided to try and improve the amount of food I can produce on my property. One of the things I have decided to try is heating my greenhouse to make it possible to grow cold weather vegetables in the winter.
I live in New England, which is located in the northeast portion of North America. Night time temperatures in winter average in the mid to low 20’s F or -single digits in celsius.
I built my greenhouse almost 10 years ago. It’s actually two relatively cheap 6’x8’ Palram greenhouses that I connected back to back on top of raised beds to make it 6’x16’. Surprisingly this greenhouse has survived several hurricanes and majors weather events. That said, it is getting a bit leaky when it comes to wind and rain.
Since there is essentially no insulation, my goal was to keep the soil temperature above freezing. This will make it possible to grow vegetables like: Spinach, Broccoli, Cabbage, Lettuce, Radish, and Arugula.
So I could have electricity, I buried an extension cord up to the greenhouse. Now obviously, I could just have electric heaters, but this would be ridiculously expensive since they would essentially run around the clock. And really those would heat the air, not the soil. Which is what I would need to keep plants alive.
Instead, I wanted to use thermal mass to do most of the heavy lifting. So here is what I did.
My idea was to hang cheap plugin water heaters inside full water barrels. Basically treating the water and the soil like a big heat battery. A thermostat would regulate the temperature, so that the heaters weren’t running around the clock. The water barrels would be pushed up against the raised beds, thereby transferring heat into the soil.
I was able to get two water barrels from my local recycling center. You should be able to find these for free or cheap from Craigslist, your local transfer station, or even your local water company.
I found the heaters, and thermostats on Amazon.
...and here is the assembled system.
You can see I have Kale and broccoli, growing right now. I have started lettuce and arugula seedlings indoors and will be planting them in the greenhouse soon. I put black contractors bags over the barrels so that they would absorb more heat during the day, and thereby need less energy to keep them warm in the evening.
I found a super cheap bluetooth thermometer so I could check the soil temperature without having to go up to the greenhouse. It took a little trial and error figuring out what temperature the thermostat should turn on the water heaters. Once I had figured that out, the soil consistently stays in the low 40’s at night. This is more than enough for hearty winter veggies to stay alive.
heating a greenhouse of any kind including a hobby greenhouse is what makes the best greenhouse. so watch this video to learn how to have a heated greenhouse.
I'm totally going to try this on Vancouver Island this Winter. Zone 8b.
Keep us posted!
just discover you greenhouse and channel. I love it. I'm building a cabin in Quebec (secondary house, but my project for my retirement)... I'm 43. My plan is to have a green house and garden as much as possible around 50, with a chicken coop to. Amazing tips, thanks.
Sounds great!
Thanks this was great. I'm thinking about doing something similar over here in the UK but I don't have access to mains electricity so it would have to be battery/solar. Can you give me any idea how many watts the setup uses, let's say on a winter day/night where external temps are just below freezing?
Manufacture says 2,000W, 120V. Might be a heavy lift for solar.
Bummer he didn't let us know what the air temperatures inside were. 🤔
Mid 40,s
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