Post by Ron Kulas on Dec 17, 2023 20:49:21 GMT -6
Our homestead is located in North East Wisconsin and so far, it's been great. We enjoy our new garden space and we have plans to expand the growing area in 2024 but one consideration for growing food at this latitude is our short, 4 month growing season which runs from June through September with the possibility of frost in late September. By starting plants indoors in March and April, we can enjoy a roughly 110 day, outdoor, growing season.
This sort of gardening has worked to produce a lot of seasonal food. Cold storage, canning, dehydrating, freeze drying and freezing allows us to extend the usage of food we grow but being able grow and enjoy fresh veggies for a longer period of time would be preferred.
My plan is to try and double the length of our growing season or perhaps even grow food, year round with proper planning. To accomplish this will require a few things.
1. A passive solar greenhouse, which is great when the sun shines but additional measures must be taken to keep the greenhouse warm at night and during any long stretches of cloudy/snowy days where we wont see the sun. The measures we must take for supplemental heating will include
2. Create (under the greenhouse) an earth/climate battery so we can store heat in the earth (directly below the greenhouse) in the summer and fall and then reclaim that heat in the late fall/winter to warm the greenhouse.
3. include (within the greenhouse) a wood fired heat source with a sand battery.
For the last year, the focus has been on site placement for the greenhouse which will be 32 x 20 feet and understanding the movement of the sun, especially during November through March when the sun is lower in the sky and the days are the shortest.
The winter nights are long and cold so focus will be on optimizing solar heating as soon as possible each day so instead of a traditional South facing, glazing wall, I will turn to the east 15 or 16 degrees.
I used online tools that told me the sun's location (for my location) on any given day of the year but I also verified for myself.
The direction to face the glazing wall was not difficult so the next step was understanding the sun's Azimuth (solar noon highest point) for each month of the year to maximize the sunlight entering the greenhouse during the coldest months with the shortest days. The shortest day is the winter solstice (Dec. 21) and the longest day is the Summer solstice (June 21)
In the summer, the greenhouse will be too hot (and not needed) for growing so its purpose will be to charge the climate battery that I will construct. We will be growing our food outside during those warm, summer months.
The primary months of growing in the greenhouse will be October through March (5 months of additional growing time)
Knowing that I want a greenhouse that is 20 feet deep and 32 feet wide, I played around with angles for the glazing wall and roof pitches to maximize the sun's energy based on the the highest point of the sun (solar noon) for each month.
Ive mentioned the Earth/climate battery several times. The concept is simple. Excavate away the earth beneath the footprint of the greenhouse, in the space, place a combination of Manifolds, headers and pipes. Then back fill the dirt over the top and use fans to push heated air, down into that soil in one corner and cooler air will come out the other corner.
These pictures should help.
This is a cross section showing the foam and just how far frost would have to travel to reach the soil below the greenhouse. The soil below the greenhouse then becomes the earth battery that can be charged with heat for use at a later date. Its sort of like radiant heating in a floor with the added boost of moving warm/moist air into the greenhouse in the cold months.
The next set of images are the greenhouse structure Im designing.
Im still working on a heating solution that takes up less growing space but this is what Ive come up with so far.
This will be an off grid greenhouse so I will need enough solar panels and storage to fill all the needs.
This is a living design and I reserve the right to modify/alter prior to building.
This sort of gardening has worked to produce a lot of seasonal food. Cold storage, canning, dehydrating, freeze drying and freezing allows us to extend the usage of food we grow but being able grow and enjoy fresh veggies for a longer period of time would be preferred.
My plan is to try and double the length of our growing season or perhaps even grow food, year round with proper planning. To accomplish this will require a few things.
1. A passive solar greenhouse, which is great when the sun shines but additional measures must be taken to keep the greenhouse warm at night and during any long stretches of cloudy/snowy days where we wont see the sun. The measures we must take for supplemental heating will include
2. Create (under the greenhouse) an earth/climate battery so we can store heat in the earth (directly below the greenhouse) in the summer and fall and then reclaim that heat in the late fall/winter to warm the greenhouse.
3. include (within the greenhouse) a wood fired heat source with a sand battery.
For the last year, the focus has been on site placement for the greenhouse which will be 32 x 20 feet and understanding the movement of the sun, especially during November through March when the sun is lower in the sky and the days are the shortest.
The winter nights are long and cold so focus will be on optimizing solar heating as soon as possible each day so instead of a traditional South facing, glazing wall, I will turn to the east 15 or 16 degrees.
I used online tools that told me the sun's location (for my location) on any given day of the year but I also verified for myself.
The direction to face the glazing wall was not difficult so the next step was understanding the sun's Azimuth (solar noon highest point) for each month of the year to maximize the sunlight entering the greenhouse during the coldest months with the shortest days. The shortest day is the winter solstice (Dec. 21) and the longest day is the Summer solstice (June 21)
In the summer, the greenhouse will be too hot (and not needed) for growing so its purpose will be to charge the climate battery that I will construct. We will be growing our food outside during those warm, summer months.
The primary months of growing in the greenhouse will be October through March (5 months of additional growing time)
Knowing that I want a greenhouse that is 20 feet deep and 32 feet wide, I played around with angles for the glazing wall and roof pitches to maximize the sun's energy based on the the highest point of the sun (solar noon) for each month.
Ive mentioned the Earth/climate battery several times. The concept is simple. Excavate away the earth beneath the footprint of the greenhouse, in the space, place a combination of Manifolds, headers and pipes. Then back fill the dirt over the top and use fans to push heated air, down into that soil in one corner and cooler air will come out the other corner.
These pictures should help.
This is a cross section showing the foam and just how far frost would have to travel to reach the soil below the greenhouse. The soil below the greenhouse then becomes the earth battery that can be charged with heat for use at a later date. Its sort of like radiant heating in a floor with the added boost of moving warm/moist air into the greenhouse in the cold months.
The next set of images are the greenhouse structure Im designing.
Im still working on a heating solution that takes up less growing space but this is what Ive come up with so far.
This will be an off grid greenhouse so I will need enough solar panels and storage to fill all the needs.
This is a living design and I reserve the right to modify/alter prior to building.