NL: Crops grow well again after high stress

Luc van den Bosch is cultivation manager at Walero BV in Bleiswijk (Netherlands). Together with his father and two uncles, he grows red bell peppers of the Maranello variety on 9 ha. At the other location of Walero, yellow bell peppers of the variety Allrounder are grown. Luc is a member of the national bell pepper commission of LTO Glaskracht Nederland and, together with colleagues, he supervises the bell pepper trials in the 2Save Energy greenhouse at Wageningen University & Research in Bleiswijk.

Late sowing date
The impressions of Van den Bosch over the first three months are positive: "The comparison with home can't be made because the trial was sown later." Because the light filled month of February was followed by dark weather, the plant stress in March was on the high side. In spite of that, the crop is growing well now."

Conserving energy, but not at the crop's expense
"Another difference with home is the minimal use of the tube heating for keeping the crop active, and ventilating moisture is not necessary, because dehumidification is available in the test. You can't tell by the plants that energy consumption is very low."

Low winter peak
An important point of attention in the test is limiting the winter peak in heat demand. It is striking that the lower temperature that was maintained during a cold week did not have any adverse effects on the crop.

Thinning fruits
Van den Bosch has become convinced of the usefulness of intensive screening against heat radiation. At home he also has two screens. Another method from the basic principles of NGG, the control of the assimilate balance by controlling the point load, if necessary by the thinning of fruits, is even further away from being applied.

Source: Kas als Energiebron