Energy consumption by greenhouses decreasing – renewables account for 40% of heat energy

Energy consumption by greenhouse enterprises should be reduced for both economic and environmental reasons. Some success has already been achieved in this, since the production of greenhouse vegetables is up while the energy consumption is down.

− Greenhouse production accounts for less than one fifth of power consumption in the agricultural sector, since statistics from the agriculture and horticulture sectors show that total consumption was 10,030 GWh, says actuary Anna-Kaisa Jaakkonen of the Natural Resources Institute of Finland (Luke).

Greenhouse enterprises prefer wood chips

The greenhouse sector has largely switched away from oil. The greatest drop was in the consumption of heavy fuel oil, which was replaced by solid fuels based on peat, wood or field biomass. In terms of types of energy, the greatest increase was in wood chip consumption, and almost one third of all heat energy was based on chips.

Consumption of light fuel oil was also down, but much less than that of heavy fuel oil. Consumers of light fuel oil tend to be companies with a short heated growing season. Examples include summer flower gardens, in which investment in solid fuel systems is not economically viable.

Winter production is energy-intensive

Electricity accounts for one third of total energy consumption by greenhouse production. The increase in electricity consumption is primarily due to the increase in winter cultivation, since lighting consumes high amounts of electricity. While the production of ornamental plants in illuminated greenhouses was clearly down on the previous statistical year, the production of winter vegetables increased. For example, the cultivation area of energy-intensive potted vegetable production has increased by as much as 25% over three years.

A future challenge lies in improving the energy efficiency of greenhouse production. With respect to heating, most oil burners have already been replaced with new solid fuel plants.

− The efficiency of electricity consumption could be enhanced by updating lighting systems and developing better cultivation techniques. In addition, steps should also be taken to make investments economically feasible so that it pays to invest, says Jaakkonen.

The energy consumption of greenhouses is investigated approximately once every third year upon compiling data for the Horticultural Survey. The survey investigated the energy consumption of greenhouse enterprises cultivating more than 1,000 m2 of heated greenhouse area.

Tables and graphs on these statistics are available on the Horticultural Statistics home page.
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