High levels of humidity in a greenhouse can significantly reduce plant yields due to its impact on transpiration rate and nutrient absorption. Humidity control is crucial in preventing the spread of pests and diseases in a greenhouse. Proper watering, adequate plant spacing, well-drained floors, warming plants, moving air, and venting moisture are ways to reduce humidity in greenhouses.
Hygrosphere humidity is important for various reasons, including plant diseases, poor growth, and reduced yields. To reduce humidity, one should ventilate the greenhouse by opening doors or windows, use exhaust fans, run a dehumidifier, and avoid excessive misting or watering. Additionally, reducing heating can help allow humidity to escape.
The ideal greenhouse humidity levels generally range between 50-70 during the day and 65-85 at night. Regularly monitor humidity with a hygrometer to maintain the optimal relative humidity setpoint for most plants. The optimal humidity level for most plants is around 80 at 80°F (27°C). Too much humidity can lead to problems such as condensate dripping from the ceiling spreading diseases and water puddles on the greenhouse floor.
Humidity management is a valuable tool to prevent diseases in greenhouses as part of overall Integrated Pest Management. Too high a level of humidity predisposes plants to fungal and bacterial infections. Maintaining humidity above 80 for more than 4 hours increases the risk of disease. It is advisable to maintain the right balance between humidity and temperature to prevent stress and disease.
In conclusion, proper humidity management is essential for maintaining healthy plants in greenhouses. However, unbalanced humidity can lead to increased stress and potential diseases.
📹 GREENHOUSE HIGH HUMIDITY – A big problem for your plants
Mold, powdery mildew and stunted plant growth can be prevented with air movement, proper air conditioning and a dehumidifier …
Should I air out my greenhouse?
Good ventilation is crucial for a greenhouse’s optimal growing environment and overall efficiency. It is essential for temperature and humidity management, with passive roof ventilation being the most common method. It also helps in air circulation and replenishing carbon dioxide, which is crucial for plant growth. The greenhouse should have air movement between 0. 2 and 0. 7 meters per second to maintain carbon dioxide levels. Air exchange is also vital, with a greenhouse requiring at least 30 air changes per hour, but ideally 60 air changes per hour to manage the environment in hot, sunny Australian conditions.
How does humidity affect the greenhouse effect?
The increase in greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane leads to a rise in Earth’s temperature, causing increased evaporation from water and land areas. This increases the concentration of water vapor in the atmosphere, as it does not condense and precipitate as easily at higher temperatures. This water vapor absorbs heat from Earth, preventing it from escaping into space, and further warms the atmosphere. This “positive feedback loop” is estimated to double the warming caused by increasing carbon dioxide alone.
The greenhouse gases in Earth’s dry air, including carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, and chlorofluorocarbons, play a significant role in trapping Earth’s radiant heat from the Sun and preventing it from escaping into space. These gases are non-condensable and cannot be converted into liquid at very cold temperatures.
Should I put a fan in my greenhouse?
Wind is essential for pollination in nature, but in greenhouses, it is crucial to replace wind with good fans to encourage plant growth. This gentle air movement helps plants develop stronger stems and root systems, improving their overall health. Hand pollinators like the Vegibee can also increase pollination.
Exhaust fans should be placed towards the roof of the greenhouse, opposite the door, and if not possible, extra circulation fans should be added. Base or roof vents should be left open during warm weather, and solar openers can be added to automatically open and close when needed. If the greenhouse offers the option to add extra vents, it is highly recommended in warm climates. At least one large vent should be placed near or on the roof to allow heat to escape, and several vents around the perimeter near the base for natural cross-ventilation.
In summary, proper ventilation, ventilation, and ventilation are essential for the success of your greenhouse.
Do fans lower humidity in greenhouse?
Greenhouse fans are used to create airflow within a greenhouse, helping to control humidity levels by directing air towards different areas and dense foliage. However, fans alone do not remove water vapor or reduce absolute humidity in the growing space. Various fans, including vertical fans and air circulators, can improve air movement in large spaces and combat humidity build-up. However, fans do not reduce the amount of water vapor found in the greenhouse, and in a saturated environment with 100 relative humidity, fans will not reduce the humidity level.
Does heat reduce humidity?
Heating the air does not increase humidity levels, as it lowers the relative humidity due to the increased capacity to hold water molecules. Heating systems should be used alongside humidifiers to maintain adequate humidity in cold winter months. HVAC systems can dehumidify a home to a degree, such as in an air conditioning unit, by removing moisture through condensation through evaporator coils. To use an air conditioner as a dehumidifier, regular cleaning of the air filter, replacement of old filters, and inspection of ductwork are recommended. If HVAC maintenance is not possible, AtlasCare offers maintenance services.
Do I need a dehumidifier in my greenhouse?
Water puddles on greenhouse floors can promote algae growth and pose a safety hazard. Too little humidity can stress plants by accelerating transpiration, so finding the right balance is crucial for plant growth. Transpiration, the loss of water from a plant, is a natural process. To optimize plant growth, special lighting, warm air, timing, and watering mechanisms are needed. Fans may be needed for air circulation, and dehumidification may be necessary for comfort and plant health.
How do you control humidity in a homemade greenhouse?
Your DIY greenhouse kit should be well-ventilated to allow fresh air to circulate and prevent moisture build-up. To improve airflow, install vents, exhaust fans, and louvers in your greenhouse structure. These features are crucial for maintaining a healthy growing environment for your plants. Although controlling humidity, moisture, and mold may be challenging, it is essential for ensuring healthy plant growth. The size and shape of your greenhouse will determine the maximum amount of ventilation add-ons you can use. By following these tips, you can ensure a healthy growing environment in your greenhouse.
Should I put a humidifier in my greenhouse?
Maintaining consistent humidity levels in greenhouses and vertical farms is crucial for plant growth and health. Proper ventilation, humidification, and cooling can aid in seedling development and healthy plant growth. However, low humidity and high temperatures can cause serious issues, such as stunted growth and slowed photosynthesis. High humidity levels can cause oedama, edge burn, soft growth, and mineral deficiencies. High humidity can also encourage disease outbreaks, which can be harmful.
Irrigation is essential for plant hydration and health, but it is insufficient for overheating and can be dangerous. Direct and abundant watering to compensate for high temperatures and low humidity levels may be necessary.
Can plants have too much humidity?
Plants use moisture to transpire, saturating leaves with water vapor. High relative humidity levels or lack of air circulation prevent water evaporation and soil nutrient extraction, leading to plant rot. Warm temperatures with low humidity increase transpiration rates, necessitating fertilization. Climate control is crucial for plant growth, as young plants close their stomata to prevent water loss. Growers use plastic tents or propagation chambers to increase relative humidity and air circulation.
Light energy is also used for transpiration, converting liquid water into vapor. Greenhouses maintain relative humidity levels below threshold values by controlling air water content to maintain a minimum transpiration rate.
Can a greenhouse be too humid?
Maintaining a consistent humidity level is crucial for growing plants in a greenhouse, as high levels can lead to diseases like botrytis or powdery mildew. Monitoring humidity levels is essential to prevent crop destruction. Controlling temperature is another challenge, as it affects consistency, transpiration, and condensation. The ideal location for a greenhouse depends on the sun’s movement and the type of crop being grown. Choosing the right location can help ensure the optimal growth conditions for your plants.
📹 Propane creates humidity and that’s bad in a greenhouse
This is a continuation of the challenges facing those who want to have a future off grid, solar, organic aquaponics agriculture …
Don’t get discouraged. But think hard before you throw more seed into the system. It might be better to regroup and wait out the weather. That sucks when you just started a Youtube website, but you don’t owe us anything. This is the nature of agriculture. Just like sustaining life on another planet there are hundreds of little factors…settings if you will…that have to be dead on for everything to work. If just one thing goes wrong it dominoes. My observation: Insulation is the key here. You need to insulate to the point where the lane itself stays above freezing…optimally 40F or even ideally 50F. You have to keep this air dry. Being a hiker and hammock camper I can say that the efficiency of passive heat will surprise you. You need lots of layers and air gaps. More plastic sheeting. Regroup and think it through, you are getting a lot of good advice through these comments.
A couple of thoughts I had, and remember you’re getting these from a history teacher not an engineer. I heat my woodshop with infrared heaters, could you put a small infrared heater on a track system like the grow lights? Move it back and forth over the beds? I have no idea how much electricity they pull, but with it moving it could cover mote area. Another idea I had which would be more of a down the road solution would be to replace your idea of layered grow beds. If you made the beds long and narrower. Built them into like a ferris wheel, with a grow light above (add an infrared heater in the winter) each bed would up and under the light and heater on a regular basis. Just some thoughts, keep up the good work!
Hi. I had a though to use smaller house hold central heaters. They already have all the safety feature built in so an single on and off is doable and linking to a computer would be simple. Two solutions to cost are to contact area ac installers that remove complete systems and try to get the gas heating unit and the a fan unit could used to make a working unit. the fan could then be use in summer as well for air circulation. Next thought would be to install the next level and drop a second tent over just the growing crop vent heated air through there first and exhaust into the big tent at the end. That way you would be using the big ten for an air gap with some heat to drop the differential between each section. Just a though. But the problem could be solved quicker for each expansion. I am a big fan of this project. Even though you are jumping in to deep right off the bat. Mike McCray Little Elm,Texas
To minimize the amount of propane you use, couldn’t you have a pilot for the propane burner inside you double barrel wood stove, connected to a temp sensor. Once that sensor detects a drop in temp, from the wood burning out, the propane takes over until it reaches a certain temp. At that point you just load up for wood fuel. Just a thought.
When I built my fodder system I had a similar set up. I would put 2″ foam board right on top of the plant stand hanging 3′ over the sides and build walls of the same material then put the plastic around that to seal up cracks. All your lighting is coming from the grow lights anyway. This will greatly reduce the amount of space to heat and pay for itself with less fuel to heat it. Just so little insulation value in plastic as you know. At least do this in the winter to keep up production my friend. God Bless, Dale the castle guy
You need to insulate. Your plastic tenting is an air barrier, but not an insulator. Try using vinyl backed R-10 fiberglass, or 2-3 inch thick foam board. Insulation is an up front cost, but decreases your heating load requirements. If you insulate, though, it needs to be continuous. Good luck and keep it up. Ask if you have questions.
Sorry to see things not working out right now. Glad you are planning to keep moving forward. I’m sure it is really hard. Seems like you need to prototype a much smaller “cold weather” solution. It might have to be very different than your current setup. Create a small area, say 100 sq ft and insulate, heat, develop automated systems and then scale that up to a larger solution when you get it to work and when finances allow. Just a thought. Hang in there. You are doing a great thing.
Jeff, As a long-time home gardener some plants recover from “frostbite”, ( although they”ll be set back in terms of maturation) provided the stems and root systems avoid frosting . FWIW, “misting” plants can/will inhibit frost damage within the cell structure in freezing conditions. OTOH, y’all might want to investigate fabbing some small tunnels or domes to put over your micro greens to trap the radiant heat from your grow lights during cold spells. Ought to be pretty cheap if crafted from spare/discarded materials on hand . You’re attending a hard school ( as countless generations of farmers before you ), inspiration requires an equal – or greater – amout of perspiration combined with observation and diligence . You’ve already demonstrated an ample amount of perseverance, IMO ! Hang in there !
If you wrap just the shelving system in the plastic instead of tenting it and you can have overlapping plastic for slots to put your arms in to tend the vegies you could direct the heat into that area only saving BTUs. leaving the tent up would act as another insulating layer. You could use magnetic strips or hook and loop strips to open and close each bay.
If you can get wood chips there is a cheap system you can build but requires some power. A hopper with auger setup would let you fill the chipped wood as needed then the only power is the auger and a backup ignition system with the rest all run off just its heat. The problem with a chip system is you need a setup to handle the odd sizes you get so it is hard to go down in scale past a point due to clogging issues when you get under a 4 inch feed auger but you can limit feed speeds to correct that. Size the hopper for a 48hr rate and have the auger setup for 24-48vDC and you can have everything run without grid power using solar/generator to recharge batteries and the tractor to refill the hopper.
I know you have mentioned cost being a real thing, and trying to utilize things which wont take much space (for trip to mars). I wonder if you could use sheets of plastic similar, or lesser mm thick to create a barrier on the inner walls of your building structure. (think insulation). Alot of people who have single pane windows use the box purchased at places like ACE hardware, to create another barrier, increasing a single pane window from R1.7 to like R2.5. I understand its not a huge difference, but a night like you speak of here, it could help save the crops, and not be TOO expensive. maybe $35 using a box of painters plastic. Love the articles! I think they’re really cool!
I haven’t seen this suggestion posted yet, so here goes: Consolidate your grow lanes into 1. Use the plastic from #2 to double up the plastic covering on #1, and only shunt heat from the wood stove to #1. This will double your insulation and heat generation with no $ outlay. It’s not a long-term solution, but it will probably get you through this winter with no additional $$ (although I realize it would be a significant physical effort). I really think you need at least 1 more layer of plastic on the grow lanes (with an air gap in between) and you’re not using the growing capacity of the 2nd lane right now.
Love these articles it’s all really interesting and keeps the brain thinking about ideas. With regards the log stove and having to constantly fill it up, could you use some sort of wood chip burner. I have a friend who uses his to heat his home, swimming pool etc. It self feeds the wood chips as long as you have a store of dry wood chippings/pellets. Wish I had a smarter idea but that’s all I’ve got for now!
I understand that wood heat is not the ultimate long term solution but there should be a way to engineer a self feeding system into a wood stove or be able to take advantage of a self feeding fire in some way. What is your heat loss at the exhaust? I still think there has to be a way to trap more of the heat into the grow lanes and further insulate them. In deep winter I would think that trying to trap the heat closer to the plants almost like low tunnels directly over the grow beds might assist. It just seems that most of the heat in the building is not trapped low enough to do any good. It just seems like the volume of air that you need to heat is too much.As the temps dip lower and lower I would think that you would concentrate more on confining and conserving the heat where it is needed most. Could the stoves draft pipes be diverted to inside the grow lanes at extreme temperatures? I understand cost is a main concern at the moment but at least from a design perspective I think that the flexibility to move heat around in a more direct way would be important. Im sure you have thought of all these things.
I am not an expert but a cheap idea to help out is to put a additional layer of plastic over each grow lane leaving a air gap. This will help insulate and hold even more heat in the grow lanes. This is not the fix all answer, not by a long shot, but it should help out. The more heat you can hold in the less heat you have to produce…
Don’t call it a failure, it’s a data point. A few things I’ve been thinking about…Can you reduce the volume of air that needs to be heated by wrapping the plant cages with plastic? Any way to create a boiler system and pump the hot water through lines that run along the plants? What about heat lamps? Would mylar be a cost effective way to provide better insulation?
You r struggling with the exact same thing i was expecting to encounter if i set up a system here in norway. so i have set my sights on making a greenhouse with double insulated windows from houses. and even be able to shut down the main production part during winter and just having a smaller indoor/heavy insulated system for a small production that will be capable to keep the fish water ok. and reduce the feed for the fish.. and moste of all have cold hardy fish like trout. i have even made up plans for a outdoor system with a outdoor pond that is design to freeze over during winter. i know that if you don’t have to much fish in the water they will survive on their own. and with more fish a small super insulated greenhouse on the side is needed to get some oxygen in the water and remove some nutrients. it should however be possible.. still you won’t have much production during the winter with a good snow layer the pond water should be possible to keep at +4c at least on the lower half of the water column. the pond need to be deep tho. i have used some time trying to come up with systems that can make it thru what you’re experiencing now and even worse. it need to be ok with weeks at -25 to -30c
hello from the uk just watched your latest vid sorry to hear you have lost your crop, while i was perusal i had athought i dont know much about this type of thing but my thought is, in your vid you are standing next to your grow beds and they are on a racking system could you cover the racking making a smaller area to heat and have an extra air space “insulation” i dont know if this would help just thought i’d mention it
The retail prices of a 20 pound propane refill is 18-24 . The bulk distribution price of propane is about 15. For a 30 pound canister the price is 20 dollars. Having a 1000 or 2000 gallon tank (rented from the distributer) you can manage your cost by commodity averageing. You know that propane cost rises in the winter so you purchase your delivery in the summer or Autumn when the price is much more reasonable. after 911 you have rules and regulations about having more than 2000 gallons on site. Many farmers purchased extra 2000 gallon tanks and had them hooked up before the regulations went in to effect. Propane powered grain dryers and livestock heaters. And household heat and furnace hot water for the rest. You can have two tanks if you separate the two or more systems IE house and livestock and grow building
Since the cold is just a seasonal issue, would it be viable to turn each shelf, or one test shelf at first, into a ‘pod system’? For example: modular panels attached to the shelving to keep the cold out but have a temporary heat tube going into the pod but still enough ventilation to allow the humidity to escape into the larger grow hab.
Lower ceilings, double walls and roof, keep chickens and pigs inside the greenhouse, or at least a compost pile. I don’t know what that means for your Mars plan but it would most certainly help keep the place above freezing. Is the ground inside your greenhouse insulated from the ground outside? If not, it should be.
I grew veg in a 20′ geodesic dome during two our most harsh winters in NE WI. I have several suggestions. Your wood burner is no more efficient than a fireplace and it is likely venting heat after the fire goes out. A true RMH will not do this. Also, the creosote abundance tells me you are not burning the wood efficiently. I learned a great deal about How Not to Build a RMH. First winter I rebuilt it 6 times. The humidity is caused by plant transpiration. You can curb that by adding CO2 to help the plants hold their water. I would also look into recapturing the moisture because on Mars it will be essential to capture every drop of moisture. Winter is a very difficult season for “testing” new theories. Don’t worry about that broccoli because it has natural antifreeze. I harvested broccoli in open fields well after the first second and third hard over night freeze(s). I haven’t watched all your build articles, but unless you insulated the underground solar battery… you are basically trying to heat the earth by pumping hot air underground. Again, I haven’t seen your design to know enough to comment, but a tent within a tent should be enough to keep it above freezing. With the power outage you dropped below freezing and that shouldn’t happen. The heat energy is being lost and/or vented.
sorry to hear about this latest set back – If I could I love to send you some money and help support you every month, but I can’t currently – the only thing I can think of you need a lot more insulation ie keeping cold out and heat in then if you then need to use less gas to heat the area….just thinking where you got the plastic over the crops would it work if you copied the design of double or triple glazing and have 2 or even 3 sheets of plastic around/over the growing area? Or even now is it worth only growing crops at certain times of year and coming back to all year growing in phase 2 or 3 and 4?
I was just reflecting on the idea that any idea put into practice first meets the provision and cost hurdle. Any change multiplies the height of that initial hurdle up to and including good money after bad. You essentially climb a cost pyramid until you reach your solution. Only by cooperation can you spread that cost matrix out. Receiving things from people who don’t need or want them, accepting help you don’t want to receive the items that you do need. It’s a tightrope walk.
So this may sound trite, but if it were easy everyone would be doing it. You have GOD on your side and HE is teaching you what doesn’t work so in the end you will have a product that will, in the end, successfully satisfy the needs of many people. Thank you for acting on the vision GOD has given you. Keep the faith because HE will not leave you or forsake you. I’m amazed at your resilience and fortitude through this endeavor. I look forward to your updates, I’m truly interested in the outcome and I’m rooting for you.
Ok this is out of my league but I was wondering if you could heat your water through a copper coil prior to entering your grow beds that way it may keep the beds from freezing and possibly put enough heat off inside the tents to keep the plants from freezing as well. The water should be cooled enough by the time it drains into the ponds that it shouldn’t harm the fish I would think. An enclosure using propane burner blowing on the coil is what I’m thinking of that way you may not use as much propane that way. Hope this gives you something to think about. Good luck and I enjoy your website!
Put the propane system on a thermostat with the minimum temperature you can handle, burn the wood during the day and when convenient and then let the propane cover the times your unavailable. It will decrease cost and increase convenience. If you’re keeping up with the wood then you spend no money on gas and if you miss a point the entire system is still safe.
Jeff I think you need to continue to reduce the space you need to heat its not practical anymore to heat these large tents. The end goal here is to get the system down to the smallest footprint possible and it looks like your environment is naturally pushing you in that direction anyways. What if you insulate only the rack and continue to push your system into a smaller footprint.
It may be a better idea to heat each plant individually with heat pads. They will eat up some power, but it may be worth it since the power is free. The fish tank wouldn’t be feasible to heat up that way, but if you got saltwater fish and added salt to the water it would have a lower freezing temperature which would reduce the heat you have to keep it at. That’s assuming that these fish are robust enough to survive at lower temperatures.
here is a thought. why don’t you put your propane heater down with the wood stove as a back up for your wood heat. if your wood stove will keep your tents warm; the propane heater will keep it warm, then use the propane as a back up heat source for when your stove burns out down in the pit. just a thought. a simple thromstat will work. wood heat is cheap as most trash will burn. propane is expensive so use it only when needed, to buy you time if your stove gos out.
Is paraffin / kerosene a possible a economic alternative to propane in this part of the world as it is the economic fuel of choce in commercial horticulture in the UK? Do the travelling growlights provide sufficient extra light for your plants, I know you said you would prefer more but could not afford more at the present time. I ask because my thoughts are wondering about reducing the air volume of your internal tents and turning them into double skinned tents with blown air separation this might also help with condensation issues and more rapid air cycle times in the tents. Double skinning will inevitably cut day light levels at the plants. I realise that immediately there are cost issues for materials and equipment as well as running cost for the fans and that electricity is at a premium! Does your tractor have a front PTO shaft (so you dont have to unhook your snowblower) like some compact tractors have and would it have enough horsepower available to drive an emergency static generator sufficient to keep electicity available for this house. If it could be driven into the house to drive a genny it also of course gives off heat when running which must help to some extent.
Seems to me you have a problem of having to much air to heat than you have BTU’s to heat it with and you’re losing heat becuase you’re not insulated enough. In a ideal world, you’d probably have insulated pole barn that could be heated to about 50 degrees. Then heating an enclose grow bed would be simpler right? So my suggestion is trying a multi-tiered tenting solution. Create another tent outside your growbed tent you have right now to create an insulating air pocket. On mars this wold be like an air lock.then the heat from the wood stove to heat the air maybe retained better? consider tenting the ground as well as it conducts cold as well (only in the area around this outer plastic). The next idea is more long term, but consider looking into radiant in floor heating. On your grow tables, install the tubing for radient heating. Perhaps a boiler using fuel oil would be cost efficient? OR figure a way to make a boiler out of a wood stove? Insulate the tables below with heated water lines, and then cover them with inexpensive tiles. Only suggest this as it would protect the tubing but also retain heat as well. They make home kits that people can install theses systems themselves. It’s just plastic tubing that screws in with clips into subfloor. Then create much smaller tents around your grow beds just big enough to contain your lights and the plants themselves to retain the heat from the radiant floor heat. You would only need this during the harshest winter months, and tenting and system could be turned off in the spring, summer, fall.
I know this isn’t practical for you, but on Mars where you need a very robust heating and power generating system I have viewed some articles here on YouTube advocating Thorium nuclear reactors that use molten salts(?… I’m no physicist just found what they were proposing interesting). From what I gather, the proponents say Thorium is very abundant resource and that it is much safer, as if a meltdown or over pressure were to ever happen, it can be emptied into an emergency tank, that once it cools they say within many hours it reverts into a cooled non-radioactive state (i.e. no China syndrome possible). I also heard, it lasts longer too. the only reason our reactors use Uranium and Plutonium (which are rarer) is that there is a military need for it, so research on other methods was defunded. On Mars you have no fossil fuels and probably limited solar energy. So you need to bring a high energy but compact fuel source with you that can keep your habitat operating for years at a time, as resupply ships can explode during liftoff. But also light enough to be lifted into orbit efficiently.
I post this on your last vid but not sure if you seen it so i’ll copy n paste it here……waste oil(used engine/cooking) stove…can easily and very very cheaply convert your wood stove or make a combo…plenty of vids on YT about it….biggest expense you’d have is gasoline transporting the FREE used oils but if you can find sources(garages/restaurants) then you can pick it up while going to your job …can run that bad boy 24/7 without havin to check it every few hours (unlike wood)once you get the oil flow rate set properly….best of luck
Sorry for your loss, and do not get discouraged. Have you thought of using off road diesel instead of propane. Small Heater Arctic (SHA) here is the link to the manufacture, itrheat.com/products/military-tent-heaters/ They have an office/warehouse in Vancouver, Washington. It uses about 1.5 Gallons per 8 hrs of operation. and outputs about 23,000 Btu’s . You can find them on amazon, ebay, and on Military Surplus sites, but prices vary ( hence the link to the manufacture). Hope this helps.
I never give advice but I want to help.Let me be clear You don’t have to use propane if you have a greenhouse.Just use compost surprisingly it releases alot of heat a friend of mine has 500 sq ft. to heat 3 acres of greenhouse in cold Wisconsin just high pills of composting wood chips though having a dual layer greenhouse won’t hurt either this should completely solve your problem and in a very sustainable way which is the true goal of Aquaponics.Please try this if you can it works and I hate to see good people waste hard earned money just because they had a lack of knowledge this is your solution not saying you won’t have to adjust it for your application.
I wanted to pass along a article of a a guy who was able to keep his greenhouse above 40F even in neg temps by using geoair heating and a few other things. youtu.be/qA3YGYELZ98 this might be a good time to install it since you don’t have crops to lose. Keep your head up and remember that there’s always something to learn from a set-back and design is a process.
I think for now it’s too big. If you could scale back the area needing to be heated. Your current set-up has the Plastic like Tunnel like 12 feet high? Really you only need a 1-2 foot cover for the plants. I’m thinking using the same bed set-up you have with 3 ft hight? for just over the light bar. I’ll message you a picture of what I’m thinking… For give me… It’s a simple quick thrown together drawing, But I’m sure you’ll get the idea of what I’m thinking. I may be totally wrong, but wanted to throw it out there for ya! 🙂 Check your FaceBook Messages.
Before I comment, I will admit that I have not watched all your articles. (Yet). Propane heating does work and I have experienced your consumption issues. Have you considered radiant heat? This does take some time to reach optimal temperatures when first switched on, but once achieved, it is very cost efficient if the growing system is designed for it. I use radiant heat in my hoop houses, but my temperatures don’t get anywhere near the extremes you are challenged with. God’s Blessings
don’t get too frustrated you will get this running. but have you thought about a propane or electric heater with a fan inside which you can change with your fan in your ventilation system. this could give an extra heat in the complete system. (in the case you don’t know which heater I mean: goo.gl/U71QP0) this could only give a heat problem at the connectors but could also give an advantage.
If you can’t create another layer of insulation on the inside of the roof then why can’t you double insulate your tents? And decrease the wasted space inside your tents to reduce your heat loss surface area. I’m only an instrumentation technician and not an engineer but this seems so obvious to me. Lack of sleep will kill your problem solving ability. You must have sleep to allow the other side of your brain to come up with the solutions that your analytical side is too tired to see. Intuition is your friend and ally. Don’t neglect half of your gifts. You have the strength and will to figure this out. Work smarter to save you from working too hard. Best of luck to you. — Another Martian — P.S. An old fashioned natural gas wall heater has all the control elements and is more safe than your propane burner. See if you can find used ones on Craigslist. You would have to change the feed gas orifice and find a way to re-range the thermostat or upgrade to a newer digital controller. A low voltage igniter would be safe and could be run from a battery if the power went out.
U should be entitled to some Primary Producers Bulk Discount rate on resources… Have u investigated what the bulk propane price is and for what minimal amount?? I have seen homesteads with huge propane tanks in their yard and a truck comes out to fill it up. Unfortunately u r in for a longer then usual cold spell in the northern hemisphere so U need to do something real quick or just advise ur customers that its too damn cold to sustain ur crops.
You’re putting way too much pressure on yourself. try and take the crop loss in stride, it’s part of the trial and error process. failures like this are unfortunately to be expected when you’re figuring out stuff as you go. don’t go planting full beds until you’re sure you won’t lose anything. if you thought you’d be up and running and be able to crank out greens in volume this winter, without having the system completely figured out and running smoothly, i’m sorry to say but you were kidding yourself