Geothermal “Greenhouse in the Snow” is popular way to grow fruits and vegetables year round
Published Oct. 13, 2023, in the Wyoming Tribune Eagle.
By Barb Gorges
A greenhouse is at the top of many gardeners’ wish lists in a climate like ours.
Hoop houses are affordable, but our wind can quickly shred them. Plus, greenhouses are expensive to heat if you want to grow through the winter, not just get an early start in spring and extend the season in the fall.
Russ Finch, of Alliance, Nebraska, where winter is even colder than here in Cheyenne, gave the problem some thought about 35 years ago.
First, for heating, he decided to go with geothermal. He’d already tried it and liked it for his home. In our climate, the temperature is a constant 50 degrees at 8 feet below ground level. If you put tubes filled with air (some systems use fluids) down there, you can circulate it to help you warm a structure in winter, or cool one in summer.
Second, he put a third of the greenhouse height below ground level. A conventional greenhouse may have tables at counter height filled with pots of plants, or plants are planted in raised beds or directly in the ground. Russ dug out a 4-foot-deep trench that was 4 feet wide for planting citrus trees. The shoulders on either side, held in place with retaining walls, grow shorter plants.
Conventional greenhouses have glass or other light-conducting coverings all the way around. Russ put a solid wall in on the north side of the long, south-facing structure to conserve heat.
Russ’s “Greenhouse in the Snow,” https://greenhouseinthesnow.com/, worked so well, other people wanted to build one. Eventually, Russ, now in his 90s, partnered with Allen Bright, who has a machine shop in Alliance and can make the overhead trusses from steel.
Laramie County Master Gardener Charles Pannebaker suggested we take a tour of this amazing greenhouse last month, and 13 of us went with him. He is the most likely of us, partnering with his son, to build one.
We toured the “New Greenhouse in the Snow,” built at Allen’s house eight years ago. His wife, Lisa, gave the tour. She has orange, lemon, lime, kumquat, grapefruit and fig trees growing along with pineapples, everbearing strawberries, vegetables and herbs, plus flowers for the bees.
While Russ made it a business taking his produce to the farmers market so people could buy locally-grown citrus, Lisa is more interested in experimenting and gives away surpluses.
Much of Lisa’s information concerned general greenhouse management issues such as how to deal with pests like whiteflies and aphids. She has turtles and toads helping, plus safe sprays. She uses a combination of drip irrigation and spray irrigation on timers.
Some crops can be grown regardless of the season, but others, like tomatoes, require additional lighting in winter because winter days are just not long enough. Lisa does not use supplemental lighting and adjusts her crops seasonally.
While a kit and labor for building this geothermally-heated greenhouse is comparable to a conventional glass one, the difference is that heating and cooling cost very little. A conventional garage heater may have to kick in when temperatures get down to minus 20.
Kits can be ordered for a structure as short as 56 feet long and in 6-foot increments up to 102 feet. Some components you buy locally. You can save on labor if you have your own backhoe and have construction experience.
Ballpark cost for the newest full-length kit is equivalent to one new pickup. Labor would equal a second, fancier truck. But you would save on your grocery bills and could skip the trips to Hawaii you used to take to warm up mid-winter.
Next to the “New Greenhouse in the Snow” at the Brights’ is the “Newest Greenhouse in the Snow” that was still under construction when we toured it.
The idea, Lisa said, is to make this one more accessible and more aesthetically pleasing. The trench is still 4 feet deep, but it is 8 feet wide and the beds on either side are only 3 feet high. The retaining walls have planting pockets in them and there are upright supports that could support hanging baskets and vines.
The north wall is heavily insulated. The 230 feet of geothermal tubes are laid directly under the greenhouse instead of buried in a trench circling it. Solar electric runs the system. The floor is covered in concrete pavers instead of woodchips. The pavers can be removed wherever trees are going to be planted.
It will be interesting to see how the newest version works. Meanwhile, the “new” version is selling like hotcakes, 700 so far. Russ and the Brights have licensed businesses in Canada and France to offer the kits so shipping costs don’t get out of hand. A deal in Australia is pending.
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