Feature Stories

Blue Lagoon Florascape committed to solar greenhouse

Great Gorp!

New projects

ARDI Council recently approved a total of $1.8 million in grants for 28 new projects. Safeguarding the environment plays a key role in these latest projects, as does the development of Manitoba’s food industry. View the entire list of projects or ARDI’s recent news release.

Argon Gas Shows Potential in Solar Greenhouse

Lori-Ann and Rene Regnier opened their solar greenhouse to the media and public at open houses in March

Now that it’s May, bone-chilling temperatures are becoming a dim, distant memory. Here’s a blunt reminder: just three short months ago, Winnipeg temperatures dropped to -38°C overnight. On February’s coldest night, like every other night this past winter, research equipment recorded indoor and outdoor temperatures at a solar greenhouse near St. Francois Xavier. Incredibly, without any supplemental heat, the low temperature indoors fell to only -5.8°C, a full 32°C warmer than outdoors.

"This winter, we tried argon gas as an insulator to prevent heat loss,” explains lead researcher Dr. Qiang Zhang. At the St. Francois Xavier solar greenhouse, energy from the sun is collected on a black, north-facing wall throughout the day. At night, the energy is released. But, the wall on its own is not enough to keep temperatures comfortable. Argon gas contained in the plastic roof of the greenhouse acted as an insulator, just as it does in modern windows.

"The potential I see with the argon is that we can actually retrofit some existing greenhouses, because it’s so easy,” says the University of Manitoba’s Dr. Zhang. “If we can do that, the impact on Manitoba’s greenhouse industry will be much bigger.”

ARDI and Manitoba Hydro are original funding partners in testing the solar greenhouse concept in Manitoba. ARDI’s contribution totals $100,000, with the latest grant approved in March, while Manitoba Hydro’s support is nearly $80,000. Blue Lagoon Florascape in St. Francois Xavier and Wenkai Oriental Vegetables in nearby Elie are providing the imagination and the greenhouse space to explore the possibilities.

"The benefits can already been seen,” says ARDI Council Chair David Gislason. “The solar greenhouse in Elie was seeded in December, and, with very little supplemental heat, was harvested and in stores by mid-March. I see great potential for solar greenhouses here in Manitoba.”

View Breakfast Television coverage from March media tour.

Great Gorp! It's an Energy Bar from Niverville

With ARDI's help, agri-entrepreneurs are commercializing their ideas across rural Manitoba. Colleen Dyck from the Niverville area is working to bring an all-natural energy bar to market in what she calls the Great Gorp Project.

"We are committed to using local ingredients in our bars, such as honey, oat, hemp, pea fibre, seabuckthorn and flax,” says Dyck. Some of the ingredients can be drawn from the family’s grain farm, but the rest will be sourced from Manitoba producers.

With the help of an ARDI grant, Dyck has been working with the Food Development Centre in Portage la Prairie to make sure that the bars will satisfy criteria for specific health claims, including high fibre content and Omega-3 fatty acids. Now, she is working with experts at the Food Development Centre to increase the shelf life of the bars and scale up her recipes from test kitchen to commercial production. Dyck hopes to have her product on the market within a year.

Colleen Dyck with her all-natural energy bar

© ARDI 2007

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