Chinese for sure! combine that with a low grade liquid geothermal heating :) (yes, I saw your video on that too). For a net-zero carbon (or as low as possible), would you suggest combining this with solar/wind/geothermal electricity as well? Such as for supplemental lighting in the winter (especially for "high value" Canadian crops if you catch my drift)
While in PRChina I was privileged enough to get to visit a family owned greenhouse. The back wall was basically rammed earth with a mound of earth/broken brick behind it. It was several hundred feet long and the variety of plants being grown was overwhelming.
There’s a farmer in Canada, a chinese immigrant family, he built one in Alberta. His name is Dong Caicai 董菜菜, and running a vegetable farm. I am trying to build one too in Virginia.
@@SimpleTek In his video, he said he just built up a team which can do the Chinese greenhouse design and installation, you can contact him for more info if you want.
Two improvements: 1. Install vibrator at the top frame to shake off snow - it saves you from heating up any snow accumulation. 2. Fill in soil for the northern wall - it will release heat during the night time.
Angus, I've tried vibrating snow off metal roofs and greenhouse roofs too. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. The snow has a great ability to simply absorb the energy without breaking free. I wish it did work, because that would be such a work saver.
@@paulmaxwell8851 The roof needs to have steep angle to start with. It is similar to some traditional houses in Japan. I have seen a two-roof design: a steeper outer metal roof with four vibrators and a flatter inner roof with blanket to roll on/off.
This is an idea that I’ve had for the south face of my 45yr old manufactured home using cattle fence panels as structure as it’s available and affordable. I enjoy your channel. -Eric (north central North Carolina)
I liked the pics with pigs inside the greenhouse, they would produce enough body heat to heat the greenhouse in winter and you can feed them the scraps and use the manure for fertilizer
Thank you for introducing these Chinese-styled greenhouses to the West. Yes, they are much cheaper to build and IMO, much more efficient than western greenhouses. However, the industrial/ commercial greenhouses called "DaPeng", (bih lean-to" , built with brick back walls, have inherent problems, mainly condensation which causes plants to mold. The original ones back in the 70s to mid-eighties were built with cob (dirt) bricks which allowed them to breathe, absorbing excess moisture. But these were abandoned due to intensive labor compared to the modern brick ones which could be slapped together much more quickly. Until recently, I spent two decades in China, consulting, designing, and building regenerative polyculture farms from the ground up and built over two hundred of these greenhouses all over China, from Heilongjiang in the North, all along the east coast to Canton province in the south and as far as Xinjiang in the west. My newest version is earth-sheltered (mostly in-ground), with solar chimneys for passive cooling in the summer. PM me if you are interested in learning more.
Wealth of info Tiger*I subbed to maintain a link as I may have question's, I have a hoop house that's not totally set up yet and want greatly to build a overwinter Chinese passive solar setup, (small enough I can handle to erect)*I have been farming basically alone as a single Dad and now caregiver to my nearly 80/yr young Mom. Thanks eh, very interesting story in China greenhouse work, good on you man.
In Iran's south we have other problems such a strong hot winds and 50C summer days. Hence, my similar profile design is turned 180 degrees and the blanket is replaced by shadecloth reducing summer heat. Near the Tropic of Cancer and the almosy directly overhead in sumner, i would use the aftenoon sun to evaporate grey or hard water in a trough in the south to humidify the 'cool' house. If the entre structure could be sealed, evaporated water can be used for irrigation also.
I have a double layer polycarbonate greenhouse thats a geodesic dome. Withstand 120 kmh wind when all the nigjbouring otther greenhouses got totally damaged. For chilling im working to make a door with a curtain of water and 5 triangular windows on top.
Interesting with the thermal mass back wall... they shade the wall (with the rolled up insulation) in summer to prevent over overheating. In winter the sun will be low and sneak under the rolled up insulation and "fill" the thermal mass throughout the day. Thanks, a nice, efficient, cheap solution they have.
Thank you so much for this wonderful video. A lot to digest and think about. So much to learn from Chinese greenhouse design and deployment model. Hope there's no political backslash/legalization to jack up/ keep the greenhouse cost/price high in the name of our usual things -Attack against inexpensive materials, "made in China", public safety, environmental safety ...etc. Cost effectiveness, simple solution for the farmer, over "tech" soundings, IP protected "products" we promote are so refreshing
Back in the ancient 1970’s When we built Passive Solar Greenhouses We always had thermal mass in the north walls of greenhouses We always had movable insulation All passive solar designs have glazing & thermal mass Attached greenhouse Direct passive Roof ponds Trombone walls Build your house like a thermos bottle w the open end pointing south
I have read about a similar greenhouse in the 90s in some books from the 70s that used water jugs on the backwall. Same principles but it suggested angling the green house so that the back wall got the most sun during the coldest months of the year.
I LOVED THE PIC WITH PIGS INSIDE THE GREENHOUSE THATS A GRAIT IDIA FOR SOMEONE WHO START HOMESTEADING AND ITS NOT READY TO SPEND TO BUILTH 2 DIFERENT PLACE FOR GARDENS AND BURN THANKS FOR SHARING YOUR PERFECT IDIAS
Thanks you so much for sharing your investigations! I´m about to apply a lot of this making my first greenhouse in south america! Liked and subscribed!!
I live and work I. Chris. For many years. I did a Chinese green house in Romania the here we have winters to -30 sometime. Never use heating and we grow 12 months a year. The Chinese design is very good ...very important is to be seal off everything at night. They are awesome French houses models.
Wow! This really is very good. The bit about thermal mass and temperature only an odd degree below zero was interesting. Climate here in Kazakhstan during winter really is low.
I took a green house building course over 25 years ago, from a retired fellow who use to teach a SAIT. Remarkably similar to this resign though not as wide and lacking the external thermal blanket. It did have the mass heat and southern orientation. The bigger the space the easier it is to regulate it. Wood would be fine.
I was already sold on the Chinese Green house design, but I failed to find a supplier. I went to Alibaba and found several options. Thanks for the information.
The only thing that's not easy to get parts for is the steel struts at that distinctive curve angle. If you want to build a small one the old steel struts of a large trampoline will provide a 30-36 degree curve each, so two or three of those on each support with a long straight pipe is going to give you the 60-90 degree curve.
You don't need to build it with curves, that's just to cut costs, weight, etc... for the ones manufacturing it. Although there is an argument about a bit of hot air being closer to the crops with curves but it's not something to look for since if the greenhouse is working properly everything will already be at proper temperature.
@@matheusfaria7230 Not sure about that, cold air has a habit of rolling downhill so the curve might help in more ways that are not immediately obvious.
Might be able to add a large solar hot water panel and get a little heat to pump inside to help warm it up. Probably wouldn't work too far north where its dark for a month, but maybe a wood stove and circulate water underground.
Not only that but on the north side you can use the shade to grow mushrooms, vent the hot air down to heat the ground underneath and that helps. Use solar/sailing wind vertical turbines to run heaters in winter
@@SimpleTek I am trying to figure out how to keep a tropical greenhouse above 20 degree celcius in the UK...... insulating the walls, earth ship berm heat storage at the northern side, hot air ground heating, Chinese greenhouse techniques, wind/solar heating, rocket mass heater..... any suggestions would be appreciated. The greenhouse size planning for is 50ft by 100ft geodesic tunnel with a 15ft lean to greenhouse on the south side 'Chinese/Victorian fusion style'. North side I had planned a 10ft earth berm with rain water capture tanks... it's just the heating thing I need to worry about.... haven't quite figured thatbout
Thank you for sharing this information! There is so much valuable knowledge lost between cultures just because it seems easy to stick with what we know.
It floors me how many people who have greenhouses here - even custom-made ones don't have even insulated walls let alone with thermal mass in them. A lot of greenhouse owners I talk to act like they have never even thought about it.
I saw a you tube video of a wallipini. It is a deep trench and earth wall, covered with a partly transparent roof in an angle so the low sun in the winter can enter the entire greenhouse and in the summer only a smaller segment. Also rain is collected via the roof and a ventilation strip is made at the top. It is a bit more expensive then a plastic greenhouse but it looked well engineered.
I saw that video two days ago and I can tell you that the green house at Red Gate farm is not a real walipini, at lest not in the traditional sense of the word. it is actually more of a passive solar greenhouse with a cold sink,and some walipini, designs thrown in.
So called Chinese greenhouse construction is derived from ancient Chinese wisdom. In ancient northern China, people including whether rich or poor, or the royals palaces, all built their main dwellings with windows and main entry doors facing south. With proper length overhang/eave and height of windows, in the summer the sunlight will not shine into windows or doors and makes room cool; while in the winter, there is plenty of sunlight shine through windows and doors and makes room warm. The wall facing north is made of clay bricks of about 20" in thickness and has no windows and doors, acting as a natural insulation. Visiting or googling forbidden city you will notice this. Chinese greenhouse construction design has much lower operating cost, they can operate just by using sunlight all year round in the US.
Don't know if it'll be cost effective or not but you could add a ground source heat pump to add a bit more heat. Then some Solar outside to power it. That Cover could have a motor added and a timer To automate the cover on and off. The ground Loops could be installed in the footprint of the poly tunnel / Chinese greenhouse Before construction. You could probably save a lot of money if you did lots of the work yourself
I'm not sure if anyone is mentioned this in the comments as I haven't gotten that far yet, but this is the same theory as the earthship houses in Arizona and New Mexico. Great idea great ingenuity and you can use simple tech to do this it's basically being smart and using what you have
@@SimpleTek I'm not sure which one has been around longer but I know they've been building the Earth ships and Arizona and New Mexico since the '70s. Either way great idea
Get rid of the cheesy music.... touch to concentrate on what you are saying.... Also I do not know anyone that orientates their greenhouse north to south... they are always east to west. jes sayin
i build a similar style green house in Canada ( i call it krywenko style greenhouse as it different enough from the Chinese greenhouse or the U of Manitoba greenhouse which is origin greenhouse for the Chinese greenhouse ) but I use snow load as part of insulation strategy and soil filled wall cavities ) . but i use it for growing peach trees and nectarine trees ( and other fruit trees up to hardiness zone 6) in a hardiness zone 2 ( -45c). sure if I used an insulating blanket I could probably grow citrus fruits in my greenhouse ... but even though the greenhouse stays "warm" there not enough light from basically from mid Nov to mid Feb for anything to grow. but i do not mind letting my greenhouse get cold between -10c to -16c during the winter as the trees need to sleep anyways .. but basically the krywenko greenhouse stays above zero to about mid Dec. then for 2 months it stays hovering around -5c to -16c ( when it -40c outside and not enough light to give it a good solar heat charge for the the night, as there is only about 4 to 6 hrs of usable sunlight at that time of year) and by March it is basically it is back to above zero , in comparison during the winter my greenhouse will have a temperature variable of about 10c degree from night to day easily tolerated by most temperate fruit trees . where as a normal hoop greenhouse will have a heat variable 60C. very few plants will survive that type of environment . my biggest issue is on very mild winters . my fruit trees might start to blossom in Jan or Feb which I do not want as their not enough light at this time of year and they will just sit in bloom forever until March or April anyways with a high risk of blossom kill if the temperature drop to very cold
Good information and presentation but the background music, if that's what it is, is annoying! Break down and get something more pleasing. I'm sure you can find something better🙂
Here in coastal BC the constraint on growing in winter is much more light availability than warmth. Since all of Canada west of Ontario is at a higher latitude than we are, I can't see this not being the case elsewhere, even with sunnier days.
I'm in Manitoba , north of winnipeg. LED light are getting cheaper and cheap for really good lights, they work well as a boost in winter for additional light after the sun goes down
Please ask Mr. Dong, who is at Calgary for growing produces with Chinese passive greenhouses: (1) czcams.com/channels/_tnLlR0TN6WOHmPc1H_Nnw.html (2) czcams.com/channels/gs_cmCc-3Nczf6_RQpqmYg.html
@@SimpleTek I have a greenhouse by Brandon, similar shape to the chinese ones but dug into a hillside. setting up some heat recovery this summer with in ground weeping tile and forced air, the back is also lined with water barrels but need to figure out a way to circulate that heat.
Have a look at the solar greenhouse ranges at AG Canada Saanich built 1981 but active solar. Len Staley, Gord Monk design transactions ASABE circa 1983 The system shown is simpler and cheaper as a passive system but the principle is the same you can take many standard GH designs and modify them to this idea. The primary difference is the North thermal storage wall instead of a sub grade forced air rock thermal storage system. The AG Canada GH also use standard Dutch energy curtains, the Chinese design seems to have external blankets. These are some excellent improvements. What this system doesnt talk about is the snow melt system that is needed to prevent the archrib gh from collapsing under snow loading- which is generally what controlls heater sizing in BC. Prof. Staley I believe did a sabatical in China which would explain why the Chinese system looks a lot like his original design from UBC.
@@Morgan2XL Mr Dong's greenhouse has two layers of plastic cover. The blanket cover is inside the first layer and the vibrators are installed at the back of the first layer. This may solve your snow removal problems.
Dont be stupid. Most of Chinese Green house comes with automation for blankets and ventilation. The earliest version was manual, but nobody use it anymore
This style of green has been built in the USA for 5 or more decades!!! The ground green house in Nebraska is an even better design. I remember seeing some of this sites work before click bait with lots of misinformation...
Walipini had them in Russia 120 yrs ago to grow Vegetables. I saw one on an Old estate in America 30 yrs ago. It faced South, 4 ft down in ground. A high North wall with dirt against it on the outside. Had rolls of thin Bamboo curtains on the ceiling to block out the sun or hold Heat at night. They grow fruit and Tomatoes inside. It looked like like 1920's construction, frame made from Galvanized metal with glass that was glazed. The old gardener told me they were for growing Pineapples originally. Pineapples were a sign of Wealth and abundance. They Use to crave Pineapples into woodwork and above the front door. The Pini part of Walipini is for Pineapple.
Chinese agriculture lasts at least 2 thousands years. That's why the less land feed 4 times populations compared to US. The green house is only small part of it. Dig into more, you will benefit from it.
@@philipkelleher2853 Not even. This site presents this work as "new" and inspirational and takes credit for knowledge that is very old school. Investigating and presenting knowledge is good but some influencers egos flower above telling the real truth that in this case actually would make the information more believable. I stopped following this site so long ago that I really do not even remember details anymore other than there are greenhouses just like this in America. One design in Nebraska uses this and adds the feature of lowering the green house into the ground some and adding natural heating from the sun's heat in the top of the greenhouse. China story makes it more attractive?
I’ve built Chinese greenhouses in Australia the biggest problem besides Chinese quality is the steel sizes nothing comparable and where we’ed use a m12 bolt they’would use m6 x4 and most pre drilled holes have to be re drilled to suit their bolts very time consuming and of coarse no English instructions which becomes a major issue when building a full climate control structure. Cheap to buy expensive to install
@@SimpleTek No doubt. I wonder how expensive it is evaluated over 50 years. This is not my area, but I care about food security enough to be interested. Once we start worrying about this again, and we get low interest to be able to invest in longer term solutions, it changes the economics completely. Bankers are getting -ve interest rates, why can't farmers? Replacing and patching poly every 5-10 years is not cheap or sustainable. Glass coatings that keep the surface clean and maximize the photosynthetically active radiation available would increase productivity. If you take that into account, an extra 10% transmission would be huge. The main issue I have with these passive solar greenhouses is the use of thermal mass. They are not given the surface area necessary to passively deal with diurnal temperature swings. Only the first 25mm of most solid material counts over this time frame - water is best because it convects but you still need surface area more than mass. I think the best would be to get the cheapest agricultural pipe for its volume, then stack it horizontally along the full length of the greenhouse, with spacers to keep a 20 mm clearance between the stacked pipes, then just fill it with water. You can work out the approximate convection rate and heat transfer between the pipe surface and the surroundings to work out the total surface area required. They aim to keep the temperatures as close to the daily average in the greenhouse as economically possible. The more pipes, the more surface area, the closer you will get, but also, the more expensive. The alternative is to have active components, such as PV panels driving fans, to deal with the high peak in at noon. They wouldn't be necessary at night. True seasonal storage is simply not possible at small scales, but having 100hrs is good enough to cope with consecutive cloudy days. I'd prefer to see hydronic pipes trenches dug a meter or so below the frost line. Circulate that round your pipe wall heat exchanger on the occasions it drops below 10C, and you'll be fine whatever the weather. If you can, the more hydronic, the longer you can get, if you can manage a month that would be impressive. Just don't dig air vents underground, that's a terrible idea. I can send some sketchup plans and calculations I did way back if you're interested.
Thank you for sharing - I would like to know the productivity of this type of greenhouse. It looks fairly simple to make and could probably be manufactured by most countries fairly cheaply.
Great info. Live in Sweden, there are a lot of abandoned green houses since Holland and Spain grow cheaper. Think it is short sighted. How about doing a video on mushroom growing houses?
Here in North America vine ripened tomatoes are hard to find or ridiculously expensive. My wife and I grow them in pots, but then we only get ripe tomatoes from July to September. Not sure what I'd do with a 100 foot greenhouse, maybe keep goats in one part?
very nice find, i love the idea of simple tech, using whats around, saw some vid of a guy doing raised beds square containers and filling with leaves that had broken down over time as his grow medium, pretty cool idea. the blankets used at night, what if they had a reflective material on the inside, would that keep more heat inside?also saw a vid of a guy in chicago, he had a small backyard green house, the north wall insulated, he banked it with snow, then over the greens he had like a see through wedding veil like material over top of the greens, 3 or 4 layers of it i think, his greens were amazing even in the winter. no heating,anyway keep doing the great vids, larry from canada
Please ask Mr. Dong, who is at Calgary for growing produces with Chinese passive greenhouses: (1) czcams.com/channels/_tnLlR0TN6WOHmPc1H_Nnw.html (2) czcams.com/channels/gs_cmCc-3Nczf6_RQpqmYg.html He plans to make $150k CAD per year with his 6 greenhouses, of which only 1 Chinese passive greenhouse and 5 greenhouses without the north wall. These greenhouses without the north wall are passive and can function for 8 months for some care. He bought a leisure farm with only 30 acres and he may make much more money with a very small portion of his farm, currently, less than 1 acre is used as farmland for greenhouses.
Russian Walipini is good too, as well as Wisconsin mans aquaponic setup using compost as heat. His video is here on youtube findable via "1 million pounds food on 3 acres"
It seems you could use water instead of soil to provide a much higher thermal mass along the back wall to keep temperatures stable. How do they vent in summer? Roll up the outer plastic wall?
I have been wanting to do this for years. We are in the panhandle of Texas (North Texas!) and I am wondering about heat. Here, we get too hot, too cold and have the strongest winds in the country. Do folks know about doing a dugout Chinese style greenhouse? Is this common? To me, going into the ground 2-5 feet would help modulate the high temps in the Summer and the low temps in the winter. Thanks 🙂
Translated - Shouguang greenhouses are generally built with earth walls, or directly built under the ground and built with excavators. The overall height is not even higher than the ground. The north wall of 10 meters and the side walls are also 7 meters thick. Keep warm and use a coal stove as an aid to get through cloudy days or heavy snow. However, in summer, waterlogging is prone to occur, and rainwater will backflow, so large-scale equipment is required to divert the water to low-lying places
I built one by accident 30 by 12 feet but facing the south. Never got below 0 until early March when I took off the insulation and we had a short cold snap. Looking at building a 70 footer by 30 feet (ideally) but may have to scale back as lumber prices are up big time. Good overview. thanks PS nice to have links to sellers.
Where they use large barrels of water to absorb the heat during the day in passive greenhouses, does it make sense to also heat up the water by pairing it with a solar water heater?
I'm copying the Chinese design for my greenhouse design. I like the design. I know, I know people in America always say that Chinese always copy America.
What do you think is better, a Chinese greenhouse or a traditional North American Greenhouse?
The one that is cheaper to build and run.
@@mkeyx82 so Chinese?
Chinese for sure! combine that with a low grade liquid geothermal heating :) (yes, I saw your video on that too).
For a net-zero carbon (or as low as possible), would you suggest combining this with solar/wind/geothermal electricity as well? Such as for supplemental lighting in the winter (especially for "high value" Canadian crops if you catch my drift)
@@nickb4344 you can use all three!!!!!
Good call! More research needed on my part for sure for putting this all together.
Keep up the great content :) I'll be watching your future vids too!
While in PRChina I was privileged enough to get to visit a family owned greenhouse. The back wall was basically rammed earth with a mound of earth/broken brick behind it. It was several hundred feet long and the variety of plants being grown was overwhelming.
Do you have pics or video??
There’s a farmer in Canada, a chinese immigrant family, he built one in Alberta. His name is Dong Caicai 董菜菜, and running a vegetable farm. I am trying to build one too in Virginia.
Dong has a great greenhouse.
@@SimpleTek his second one is almost done.
@@SimpleTek In his video, he said he just built up a team which can do the Chinese greenhouse design and installation, you can contact him for more info if you want.
Two improvements:
1. Install vibrator at the top frame to shake off snow - it saves you from heating up any snow accumulation.
2. Fill in soil for the northern wall - it will release heat during the night time.
good idea
Angus, I've tried vibrating snow off metal roofs and greenhouse roofs too. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. The snow has a great ability to simply absorb the energy without breaking free. I wish it did work, because that would be such a work saver.
@@paulmaxwell8851 The roof needs to have steep angle to start with. It is similar to some traditional houses in Japan. I have seen a two-roof design: a steeper outer metal roof with four vibrators and a flatter inner roof with blanket to roll on/off.
This is an idea that I’ve had for the south face of my 45yr old manufactured home using cattle fence panels as structure as it’s available and affordable. I enjoy your channel. -Eric (north central North Carolina)
lots of people have made greenhouses out of caste panels on CZcams!
I liked the pics with pigs inside the greenhouse, they would produce enough body heat to heat the greenhouse in winter and you can feed them the scraps and use the manure for fertilizer
exactly!
That's smart.
Thank you for introducing these Chinese-styled greenhouses to the West. Yes, they are much cheaper to build and IMO, much more efficient than western greenhouses. However, the industrial/ commercial greenhouses called "DaPeng", (bih lean-to" , built with brick back walls, have inherent problems, mainly condensation which causes plants to mold. The original ones back in the 70s to mid-eighties were built with cob (dirt) bricks which allowed them to breathe, absorbing excess moisture. But these were abandoned due to intensive labor compared to the modern brick ones which could be slapped together much more quickly.
Until recently, I spent two decades in China, consulting, designing, and building regenerative polyculture farms from the ground up and built over two hundred of these greenhouses all over China, from Heilongjiang in the North, all along the east coast to Canton province in the south and as far as Xinjiang in the west. My newest version is earth-sheltered (mostly in-ground), with solar chimneys for passive cooling in the summer. PM me if you are interested in learning more.
Great insight! Thank you
Wealth of info Tiger*I subbed to maintain a link as I may have question's, I have a hoop house that's not totally set up yet and want greatly to build a overwinter Chinese passive solar setup, (small enough I can handle to erect)*I have been farming basically alone as a single Dad and now caregiver to my nearly 80/yr young Mom. Thanks eh, very interesting story in China greenhouse work, good on you man.
@@Akira-ed3wd keep it going!
Are there any books, which one can read to learn more about the design of the greenhouses?
Yes. There is "the Chinese Greenhouse" by Dan Charis and you might also be interested in "The Earth Sheltered Solar Greenhouse Book"@@og7748
In Iran's south we have other problems such a strong hot winds and 50C summer days. Hence, my similar profile design is turned 180 degrees and the blanket is replaced by shadecloth reducing summer heat. Near the Tropic of Cancer and the almosy directly overhead in sumner, i would use the aftenoon sun to evaporate grey or hard water in a trough in the south to humidify the 'cool' house.
If the entre structure could be sealed, evaporated water can be used for irrigation also.
sounds like cooling is your main concern. I have several videos on that
I have a double layer polycarbonate greenhouse thats a geodesic dome.
Withstand 120 kmh wind when all the nigjbouring otther greenhouses got totally damaged.
For chilling im working to make a door with a curtain of water and 5 triangular windows on top.
Interesting with the thermal mass back wall... they shade the wall (with the rolled up insulation) in summer to prevent over overheating. In winter the sun will be low and sneak under the rolled up insulation and "fill" the thermal mass throughout the day. Thanks, a nice, efficient, cheap solution they have.
Thank you so much for this wonderful video. A lot to digest and think about. So much to learn from Chinese greenhouse design and deployment model. Hope there's no political backslash/legalization to jack up/ keep the greenhouse cost/price high in the name of our usual things -Attack against inexpensive materials, "made in China", public safety, environmental safety ...etc. Cost effectiveness, simple solution for the farmer, over "tech" soundings, IP protected "products" we promote are so refreshing
Thank you too much for the kind words!
Talked to a Chinese solar greenhouse owner (Dong on CZcams). Said it is cheaper just to build them here than it is to order from China.
building anything from scratch materials is usually cheaper than kits
Back in the ancient 1970’s
When we built Passive Solar Greenhouses
We always had thermal mass in the north walls of greenhouses
We always had movable insulation
All passive solar designs have glazing & thermal mass
Attached greenhouse
Direct passive
Roof ponds
Trombone walls
Build your house like a thermos bottle w the open end pointing south
That's awesome! Thank you for sharing!
Trimble wall? Trombe wall? Did the spell checker get you too?
I own a row house, a Northside roof, lots of shadows in the garden, and no chance for a greenhouse.
I think it's worth checking out. Passive heat that keeps greenhouse warm is always worth more.
Very true
I have read about a similar greenhouse in the 90s in some books from the 70s that used water jugs on the backwall. Same principles but it suggested angling the green house so that the back wall got the most sun during the coldest months of the year.
check my video on passive solar greenhouses
Just built it next to yellows tone geyser
All I can say is, I LIKE IT!!! I'm going to look into this further. Thanks for the video/information!! Great job.
Thank you for the kind words
I LOVED THE PIC WITH PIGS INSIDE THE GREENHOUSE THATS A GRAIT IDIA FOR SOMEONE WHO START HOMESTEADING AND ITS NOT READY TO SPEND TO BUILTH 2 DIFERENT PLACE FOR GARDENS AND BURN THANKS FOR SHARING YOUR PERFECT IDIAS
Thank you for the kind words!
Thanks you so much for sharing your investigations! I´m about to apply a lot of this making my first greenhouse in south america! Liked and subscribed!!
Cheers from Canada! Thank you soo much for the kind words. Check out my greenhouse cooling videos!
I live and work I. Chris. For many years. I did a Chinese green house in Romania the here we have winters to -30 sometime. Never use heating and we grow 12 months a year. The Chinese design is very good ...very important is to be seal off everything at night. They are awesome French houses models.
That video was soooo much useful with real information with real experience from someone in the field ❤ thank you so much bro
You’re welcome
good stuff. the concept of thermal mass would go hand in hand with earships quite well. thanks for video
you're welcome
Wow! This really is very good. The bit about thermal mass and temperature only an odd degree below zero was interesting. Climate here in Kazakhstan during winter really is low.
Thank you
I took a green house building course over 25 years ago, from a retired fellow who use to teach a SAIT. Remarkably similar to this resign though not as wide and lacking the external thermal blanket. It did have the mass heat and southern orientation. The bigger the space the easier it is to regulate it. Wood would be fine.
correct ,this is green house we use all over the north part of China. you can see it everywhere.
Thank you for the info!!!!! Cheers from Manitoba Canada
Where's north? North pole? Or mars?
I was already sold on the Chinese Green house design, but I failed to find a supplier. I went to Alibaba and found several options. Thanks for the information.
You're very welcome! Glad I could help! keep me updated on your progress!
As with buying online, be careful with your choice of supplier. There are some very good products but some tacky one.
@@Zerpentsa6598 exactly
Something about this guy makes my tinnitus seem somewhat pleasant.
soo happy I could help. Comments from morons focused on the negative always makes my day
Blanket can also serve as light deprivation for short-day species..
nice!
The only thing that's not easy to get parts for is the steel struts at that distinctive curve angle.
If you want to build a small one the old steel struts of a large trampoline will provide a 30-36 degree curve each, so two or three of those on each support with a long straight pipe is going to give you the 60-90 degree curve.
good point, but that's only on ones you build for yourself from scratch. you can order them for China pre-made with the right bends in the steel
@@SimpleTek the ones ive seen were WAY too big for my 1/2 arce back yard..where are you seeing the small ones
Barbara
@@barbarakoenig3388 you make them DIY !!!
You don't need to build it with curves, that's just to cut costs, weight, etc... for the ones manufacturing it.
Although there is an argument about a bit of hot air being closer to the crops with curves but it's not something to look for since if the greenhouse is working properly everything will already be at proper temperature.
@@matheusfaria7230 Not sure about that, cold air has a habit of rolling downhill so the curve might help in more ways that are not immediately obvious.
Might be able to add a large solar hot water panel and get a little heat to pump inside to help warm it up. Probably wouldn't work too far north where its dark for a month, but maybe a wood stove and circulate water underground.
Good ideas
Not only that but on the north side you can use the shade to grow mushrooms, vent the hot air down to heat the ground underneath and that helps. Use solar/sailing wind vertical turbines to run heaters in winter
I like it!!!!!
@@SimpleTek I am trying to figure out how to keep a tropical greenhouse above 20 degree celcius in the UK...... insulating the walls, earth ship berm heat storage at the northern side, hot air ground heating, Chinese greenhouse techniques, wind/solar heating, rocket mass heater..... any suggestions would be appreciated. The greenhouse size planning for is 50ft by 100ft geodesic tunnel with a 15ft lean to greenhouse on the south side 'Chinese/Victorian fusion style'. North side I had planned a 10ft earth berm with rain water capture tanks... it's just the heating thing I need to worry about.... haven't quite figured thatbout
Love your videos - audio is a work in progress.
Thank you soo much! Hopefully the cable for my new mic comes in this week!!!!
Very very good job done , Mate . Love all your ideas . keep coming with some more new ideas , thanx once agn.
Thank you for the kind words
seems like a clever design
It is. They are all over china.
Thanks I appreciate your time discussing this option
This "Chinese Greenhouse" reminded me of the growing space in the "Earthships" being built in Arizona?
The reason so many greenhouses in the US are oriented N-S is that a lot of the US is below 40° Latitude.
And that faces the sun
I'm glad the algorithm showed me this today. All hail the algorithm.
Thank you for sharing this information! There is so much valuable knowledge lost between cultures just because it seems easy to stick with what we know.
You're so welcome!
It floors me how many people who have greenhouses here - even custom-made ones don't have even insulated walls let alone with thermal mass in them.
A lot of greenhouse owners I talk to act like they have never even thought about it.
yep!
it's soo easy to insulate the north wall of a hoop house too - slip styrofoam sheets between the metal poles and the inflated plastic
I saw a you tube video of a wallipini. It is a deep trench and earth wall, covered with a partly transparent roof in an angle so the low sun in the winter can enter the entire greenhouse and in the summer only a smaller segment. Also rain is collected via the roof and a ventilation strip is made at the top. It is a bit more expensive then a plastic greenhouse but it looked well engineered.
Walipini are great at the equator, where the sun isn’t at an angle, in northern climates wakipini get restricted sunlight
I saw that video two days ago and I can tell you that the green house at Red Gate farm is not a real walipini, at lest not in the traditional sense of the word. it is actually more of a passive solar greenhouse with a cold sink,and some walipini, designs
thrown in.
So called Chinese greenhouse construction is derived from ancient Chinese wisdom. In ancient northern China, people including whether rich or poor, or the royals palaces, all built their main dwellings with windows and main entry doors facing south. With proper length overhang/eave and height of windows, in the summer the sunlight will not shine into windows or doors and makes room cool; while in the winter, there is plenty of sunlight shine through windows and doors and makes room warm. The wall facing north is made of clay bricks of about 20" in thickness and has no windows and doors, acting as a natural insulation. Visiting or googling forbidden city you will notice this.
Chinese greenhouse construction design has much lower operating cost, they can operate just by using sunlight all year round in the US.
Well said
Excellent
Thank you! Cheers!
Thank you so much for enlightening me. These green houses seem like a Golden goose.
Thank you for the kind words
Saw this, along with Earth ships in Canada around 7 years ago 😊
ok
I would like to see a productivity comparison with this and a walpini
Good idea.
It's like the ancient fruit walls, buffering heat. But now with plastics more is possible.
It can be improved by insulating the back of the wall.
Agreed
Wonderful videos you make, thank you :-)
So nice of you
Excellent set up and video!!
Thank you soo much!
Amazing information. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you for the kind words!
We had those in holland in the 30s and 40s
sweet
Don't know if it'll be cost effective or not but you could add a ground source heat pump to add a bit more heat. Then some Solar outside to power it. That Cover could have a motor added and a timer To automate the cover on and off. The ground Loops could be installed in the footprint of the poly tunnel / Chinese greenhouse Before construction. You could probably save a lot of money if you did lots of the work yourself
I'm not sure if anyone is mentioned this in the comments as I haven't gotten that far yet, but this is the same theory as the earthship houses in Arizona and New Mexico. Great idea great ingenuity and you can use simple tech to do this it's basically being smart and using what you have
where do you think earth ships got the idea from?
@@SimpleTek I'm not sure which one has been around longer but I know they've been building the Earth ships and Arizona and New Mexico since the '70s. Either way great idea
Get rid of the cheesy music.... touch to concentrate on what you are saying.... Also I do not know anyone that orientates their greenhouse north to south... they are always east to west. jes sayin
i build a similar style green house in Canada ( i call it krywenko style greenhouse as it different enough from the Chinese greenhouse or the U of Manitoba greenhouse which is origin greenhouse for the Chinese greenhouse ) but I use snow load as part of insulation strategy and soil filled wall cavities ) . but i use it for growing peach trees and nectarine trees ( and other fruit trees up to hardiness zone 6) in a hardiness zone 2 ( -45c). sure if I used an insulating blanket I could probably grow citrus fruits in my greenhouse ... but even though the greenhouse stays "warm" there not enough light from basically from mid Nov to mid Feb for anything to grow. but i do not mind letting my greenhouse get cold between -10c to -16c during the winter as the trees need to sleep anyways .. but basically the krywenko greenhouse stays above zero to about mid Dec. then for 2 months it stays hovering around -5c to -16c ( when it -40c outside and not enough light to give it a good solar heat charge for the the night, as there is only about 4 to 6 hrs of usable sunlight at that time of year) and by March it is basically it is back to above zero , in comparison during the winter my greenhouse will have a temperature variable of about 10c degree from night to day easily tolerated by most temperate fruit trees . where as a normal hoop greenhouse will have a heat variable 60C. very few plants will survive that type of environment . my biggest issue is on very mild winters . my fruit trees might start to blossom in Jan or Feb which I do not want as their not enough light at this time of year and they will just sit in bloom forever until March or April anyways with a high risk of blossom kill if the temperature drop to very cold
The music was so not necessary... thanks for sharing it, thw world is already better because of you and I.
Impressive 👍 and so interesting.
Thank you! Cheers!
I like the way you think
Your a very smart man
Thank you
I appreciate that! Thank you for the kind words
Thanks
Welcome
Very informative cheaper then going with geo-thermal !
True, but I have some very affordable geothermal greenhouse videos in my archives too
You can find this type of green house in AB, which is build by Dong Jianyi. He also has a CZcams channel.
Dong build an awesome greenhouse
Thank you a lot.
Good information and presentation but the background music, if that's what it is, is annoying! Break down and get something more pleasing. I'm sure you can find something better🙂
The MAJOR problem no matter what the temperatures go down to is LIGHT ... not enough light = no growth or low growth
Absolutely correct
Here in coastal BC the constraint on growing in winter is much more light availability than warmth. Since all of Canada west of Ontario is at a higher latitude than we are, I can't see this not being the case elsewhere, even with sunnier days.
I'm in Manitoba , north of winnipeg. LED light are getting cheaper and cheap for really good lights, they work well as a boost in winter for additional light after the sun goes down
Please ask Mr. Dong, who is at Calgary for growing produces with Chinese passive greenhouses: (1) czcams.com/channels/_tnLlR0TN6WOHmPc1H_Nnw.html (2) czcams.com/channels/gs_cmCc-3Nczf6_RQpqmYg.html
@@SimpleTek I have a greenhouse by Brandon, similar shape to the chinese ones but dug into a hillside. setting up some heat recovery this summer with in ground weeping tile and forced air, the back is also lined with water barrels but need to figure out a way to circulate that heat.
Have a look at the solar greenhouse ranges at AG Canada Saanich built 1981 but active solar.
Len Staley, Gord Monk design transactions ASABE circa 1983
The system shown is simpler and cheaper as a passive system but the principle is the same you can take many standard GH designs and modify them to this idea. The primary difference is the North thermal storage wall instead of a sub grade forced air rock thermal storage system. The AG Canada GH also use standard Dutch energy curtains, the Chinese design seems to have external blankets.
These are some excellent improvements.
What this system doesnt talk about is the snow melt system that is needed to prevent the archrib gh from collapsing under snow loading- which is generally what controlls heater sizing in BC.
Prof. Staley I believe did a sabatical in China which would explain why the Chinese system looks a lot like his original design from UBC.
@@Morgan2XL Mr Dong's greenhouse has two layers of plastic cover. The blanket cover is inside the first layer and the vibrators are installed at the back of the first layer. This may solve your snow removal problems.
Perfect for Hydro and Aquaponics... water becomes your thermal mass.
Thanks man for sharing! Just discovered this "common sense" greenhouse design. 👍🙏
you're welcome!
beautiful stuff. yeah. earth=thermal mass. key.
Thank you
Dont be stupid. Most of Chinese Green house comes with automation for blankets and ventilation.
The earliest version was manual, but nobody use it anymore
I think you'll find huge sections of China still doing it manually.....
Most of the greenhouses here in North China are manually operated.
Greetings from Beijing
This style of green has been built in the USA for 5 or more decades!!! The ground green house in Nebraska is an even better design. I remember seeing some of this sites work before click bait with lots of misinformation...
Walipini had them in Russia 120 yrs ago to grow Vegetables. I saw one on an Old estate in America 30 yrs ago. It faced South, 4 ft down in ground. A high North wall with dirt against it on the outside. Had rolls of thin Bamboo curtains on the ceiling to block out the sun or hold Heat at night. They grow fruit and Tomatoes inside. It looked like like 1920's construction, frame made from Galvanized metal with glass that was glazed. The old gardener told me they were for growing Pineapples originally. Pineapples were a sign of Wealth and abundance. They Use to crave Pineapples into woodwork and above the front door. The Pini part of Walipini is for Pineapple.
Chinese agriculture lasts at least 2 thousands years. That's why the less land feed 4 times populations compared to US. The green house is only small part of it. Dig into more, you will benefit from it.
Are you saying it is wong to investigate all designs ?
@@philipkelleher2853 Not even. This site presents this work as "new" and inspirational and takes credit for knowledge that is very old school. Investigating and presenting knowledge is good but some influencers egos flower above telling the real truth that in this case actually would make the information more believable. I stopped following this site so long ago that I really do not even remember details anymore other than there are greenhouses just like this in America. One design in Nebraska uses this and adds the feature of lowering the green house into the ground some and adding natural heating from the sun's heat in the top of the greenhouse. China story makes it more attractive?
If its so ubiquitous, can you give me a link to a pdf of the construction plans?
I’ve built Chinese greenhouses in Australia the biggest problem besides Chinese quality is the steel sizes nothing comparable and where we’ed use a m12 bolt they’would use m6 x4 and most pre drilled holes have to be re drilled to suit their bolts very time consuming and of coarse no English instructions which becomes a major issue when building a full climate control structure. Cheap to buy expensive to install
I wonder what the glass version of this looks like. Low e, self cleaning and UV coatings with the durability of it all would make this incredible.
Expensive!
@@SimpleTek No doubt. I wonder how expensive it is evaluated over 50 years. This is not my area, but I care about food security enough to be interested. Once we start worrying about this again, and we get low interest to be able to invest in longer term solutions, it changes the economics completely. Bankers are getting -ve interest rates, why can't farmers? Replacing and patching poly every 5-10 years is not cheap or sustainable.
Glass coatings that keep the surface clean and maximize the photosynthetically active radiation available would increase productivity. If you take that into account, an extra 10% transmission would be huge.
The main issue I have with these passive solar greenhouses is the use of thermal mass. They are not given the surface area necessary to passively deal with diurnal temperature swings. Only the first 25mm of most solid material counts over this time frame - water is best because it convects but you still need surface area more than mass.
I think the best would be to get the cheapest agricultural pipe for its volume, then stack it horizontally along the full length of the greenhouse, with spacers to keep a 20 mm clearance between the stacked pipes, then just fill it with water. You can work out the approximate convection rate and heat transfer between the pipe surface and the surroundings to work out the total surface area required.
They aim to keep the temperatures as close to the daily average in the greenhouse as economically possible. The more pipes, the more surface area, the closer you will get, but also, the more expensive. The alternative is to have active components, such as PV panels driving fans, to deal with the high peak in at noon. They wouldn't be necessary at night.
True seasonal storage is simply not possible at small scales, but having 100hrs is good enough to cope with consecutive cloudy days. I'd prefer to see hydronic pipes trenches dug a meter or so below the frost line. Circulate that round your pipe wall heat exchanger on the occasions it drops below 10C, and you'll be fine whatever the weather. If you can, the more hydronic, the longer you can get, if you can manage a month that would be impressive. Just don't dig air vents underground, that's a terrible idea.
I can send some sketchup plans and calculations I did way back if you're interested.
@@FrankReif you can replace the poly every 5 years and in 50 years you’ll still be ahead. And that’s not even accounting for the time value of money
@@SimpleTek Including productivity gains of say 5%. With 1% interest. That doesn't feel right to me.
@@FrankReif maybe
now when you say clay, do you mean ceramic brick, sun baked mud bricks, clay or compacted dirt?
All work but what you use depends on what you have available in your location.
That’s a really great idea, 100 ft by 40 ft can grow a lot of veggies
I think so too!
breaking your back on the small side is a nogo for me.
I don’t understand what you are trying to say?
Thank you for sharing - I would like to know the productivity of this type of greenhouse. It looks fairly simple to make and could probably be manufactured by most countries fairly cheaply.
Production is similar to any other greenhouse
Passive greenhouse?
Watch page 9:54 before you take it.
What installed on the thermal mass wall? Some sort of powered circulation?
some greenhouses use the ground below as a thermal mass and pump water in-between to transfer stored heat
@@SimpleTek you have a point. But this video is on passive GH.
I tuned in to see greenhouses but you were in the way.
I'm better looking than a greenhouse
Which 1 is better depend on the type of crop you have in mind, level of UV , solar ray, internal temperature , etc...😑
true
Great info. Live in Sweden, there are a lot of abandoned green houses since Holland and Spain grow cheaper. Think it is short sighted. How about doing a video on mushroom growing houses?
Thanks for sharing! soon...
Here in North America vine ripened tomatoes are hard to find or ridiculously expensive. My wife and I grow them in pots, but then we only get ripe tomatoes from July to September. Not sure what I'd do with a 100 foot greenhouse, maybe keep goats in one part?
super interesting! though i don't understand the need for the annoying music in the background..
Thank you
very nice find, i love the idea of simple tech, using whats around, saw some vid of a guy doing raised beds square containers and filling with leaves that had broken down over time as his grow medium, pretty cool idea. the blankets used at night, what if they had a reflective material on the inside, would that keep more heat inside?also saw a vid of a guy in chicago, he had a small backyard green house, the north wall insulated, he banked it with snow, then over the greens he had like a see through wedding veil like material over top of the greens, 3 or 4 layers of it i think, his greens were amazing even in the winter. no heating,anyway keep doing the great vids, larry from canada
cool ideas! Thank you for sharing!
Please ask Mr. Dong, who is at Calgary for growing produces with Chinese passive greenhouses: (1) czcams.com/channels/_tnLlR0TN6WOHmPc1H_Nnw.html (2) czcams.com/channels/gs_cmCc-3Nczf6_RQpqmYg.html He plans to make $150k CAD per year with his 6 greenhouses, of which only 1 Chinese passive greenhouse and 5 greenhouses without the north wall. These greenhouses without the north wall are passive and can function for 8 months for some care. He bought a leisure farm with only 30 acres and he may make much more money with a very small portion of his farm, currently, less than 1 acre is used as farmland for greenhouses.
Russian Walipini is good too, as well as Wisconsin mans aquaponic setup using compost as heat.
His video is here on youtube findable via "1 million pounds food on 3 acres"
Did you saw the new kind of stone battery’s? Guess would be nice to combine such thing with a greenhouse
What is the best way to automate night insulation with soft blankets or something else ? Thanks
Muscle power lol
A superior yet cheaper design 😊
it's a great design
I could not find a complete kit on Alibaba only the plastic could you help me out with that could you be more specific
Look harder maybe
It seems you could use water instead of soil to provide a much higher thermal mass along the back wall to keep temperatures stable. How do they vent in summer? Roll up the outer plastic wall?
I have been wanting to do this for years. We are in the panhandle of Texas (North Texas!) and I am wondering about heat. Here, we get too hot, too cold and have the strongest winds in the country. Do folks know about doing a dugout Chinese style greenhouse? Is this common? To me, going into the ground 2-5 feet would help modulate the high temps in the Summer and the low temps in the winter. Thanks 🙂
You’re on the right track
Thanks. Good video
Thank you for the kind words
寿光大棚，一般是用土墙，或直接把大棚建造在地面下，使用挖掘机建造，总体高度甚至不高于地面，10几米的北墙，侧墙也厚达7米，黑天会用保温棉保温，用煤火炉做辅助度过阴天或大雪。但是夏天容易出现内涝，雨水会倒灌，所以要大型设备疏导积水至低洼处
I wish I could translate this
Translated - Shouguang greenhouses are generally built with earth walls, or directly built under the ground and built with excavators. The overall height is not even higher than the ground. The north wall of 10 meters and the side walls are also 7 meters thick. Keep warm and use a coal stove as an aid to get through cloudy days or heavy snow. However, in summer, waterlogging is prone to occur, and rainwater will backflow, so large-scale equipment is required to divert the water to low-lying places
Thank You for this information. I would be interested in a playlist on Chinese Greenhouses with applications, plans, DIY etc. Can you add more ideas?
Thank you!!! New videos coming soon
Traditional, the heat sink should be horizontal, the floor.
i prefer a floor heat sink
Thank you very interesting.
My only negative is the music being a little annoying.
Thank you
I built one by accident 30 by 12 feet but facing the south. Never got below 0 until early March when I took off the insulation and we had a short cold snap. Looking at building a 70 footer by 30 feet (ideally) but may have to scale back as lumber prices are up big time. Good overview. thanks PS nice to have links to sellers.
lumber is so high its actually comparable to metal - check it out - as metal is much better for a greenhouse considering humidity and heat!
100 m (350 ft ) long by 12 - 15 m (50 ft) wide is normal size. Small size cannot generate enough heat to keep the house warm.
Where they use large barrels of water to absorb the heat during the day in passive greenhouses, does it make sense to also heat up the water by pairing it with a solar water heater?
Yes!
Check out greenhouse in the snow.
Very familiar with Russ’s work!!!
@@SimpleTek
I love this old newfound technology. So facinating.
shame about background sound. I would have liked to finish video
I’m learning….
I am wondering if you can use some of the earthship technology in the construction.
earthships took from Chinese greenhouse technology. Chinese greenhouse design is older
Clay is the best for the north wall, 1m to 1.5 m wide.
I'm surprised the back wall isn't painted black.
That’s a great idea with a thermal mass
Your audio level is really low! Might try a new mic, get a good one. Audio is half our intake or more.
Great video, keep up the great work!
Working on it! New video today is with the new mic! thank you
I'm copying the Chinese design for my greenhouse design. I like the design. I know, I know people in America always say that Chinese always copy America.
it's a good design