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Minnesota expands deep winter greenhouse project

University of Minnesota Extension is working with several farms across the state to increase the scale and effectiveness of deep winter greenhouses.

Greg Schweser with the university’s regional sustainable development partnerships says the project brings together small and medium-sized fruit and vegetable growers.

“We had people interested in developing these passive solar greenhouses they could use to grow crops in the wintertime without having to rely on delivered heat (like) propane or fossil fuel heat or any kind of heat. People are trying to reduce the amount of energy it takes to grow crops in the winter.”

Deep winter greenhouses are heavily insulated and use a steeply sloped south-facing glazing wall to capture solar heat in the daytime, which is drawn underground and stored in soil or rock for use at night.

He tells Brownfield they are calling the latest design the farm-scale deep winter greenhouse.

“It’s a little bit larger, it’s about three times larger. And there are some differences to the structure and to some of the ways that it works that we’ve reduced the cost per square foot.”

Schweser says optimal crops for deep winter greenhouses include brassicas, Asian greens, and lettuces.

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