John Krzesicki talks with Thomas Bourgeois from Pace Energy and Climate Center in his continuing series “Living on the Edge”. In today’s episode John discusses powering greenhouses and local food production.
Transcript
Welcome to the PSR PowerTALK podcast produced by Power Systems Research.
00:06 John Krzesicki
Hello, my name is John Krzesicki.
Today it’s my pleasure to host the Power Systems “Living on the Edge” series. The show revealed conversations with industry experts and their insight into the future with intelligent technology. With over 30 years of experience supporting the manufacturing industry, I’ve seen an unbelievable change in technology.
One of today’s challenges is designing equipment used to manage power for the growing sector of greenhouses. Powering greenhouses will be today’s topic.
Today it’s my pleasure to introduce Tom Bourgeois. He’s a Deputy Director for Pace Energy and Climate Center. Tom has published several papers around in energy infrastructure and has also been involved with supporting energy organizations around, mostly the Northeast.
And today, Tom, welcome.
00:54 Tom Bourgeois
Good morning, John. Thank you very much for this opportunity. I’m looking forward to it.
00:58 John Krzesicki
Before we, we jump into our topic or our subject here, just, Tom, could you give us a little background on, of, you know, Pace Energy and what they are, who they are, and little bit about yourself.
01:09 Tom Bourgeois
Certainly. I’m the, I serve as the Deputy Director for the Pace Energy and Climate Center. We are located at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law, Pace University in White Plains, NY. And let me take a moment to say that our law school this year was named the number one Environmental law program in the nation by U.S. News and World Report. As a matter of fact, in two of the last three years, we’ve held the number one position.
We are a not-for-profit group. We’ve been in existence since 1988. We were founded by former Congressman Dick Ottinger, who chaired the House Energy Committee during the Reagan administration and, and President Carter’s term in office. And also served, he’s Dean emeritus, served as Dean at Pace University.
I also serve as the director for the US Department of Energy’s New York, New Jersey Combined Heat and Power. I’ll use the acronym CHP, Combined Heat and Power, Center. We cover New York and New Jersey. Were one of 10 centers at 8 institutions throughout the United States, funded by the Department of Energy.
Prior to that, I also worked in New York and New England doing combined heat and power. Again, on behalf of the Department of Energy.
Here I’m speaking as, in my role as the Deputy Director of the Pace Energy and Climate Center.
02:35 John Krzesicki
OK, thank you. Thank you for that background and resume. We really appreciate that.
Now today’s topic we’re going to talk about greenhouses and, actually, you know, smart greenhouses and how that, how that’s kind of changing in terms of the market.
So, Tom, could you just give us, you know, why is a greenhouse necessary? Just a real easy first question.
03:00 Tom Bourgeois
Well, the greenhouse concept, a greenhouse may be seen to be, uh, desirable. I wouldn’t say necessary, but certainly desirable for a variety of reasons, and we can get into this a little bit more later on in our conversation. But it provides fresh products, you know, locally grown food. It provides food resiliency for a particular neighborhood or a particular area. It also can provide, obviously, local income, economic development and, and jobs. So, uh, the greenhouse is an increasingly interesting area of growing, I would say, in interest around the United States.
We became more interested in this topic at Pace Energy and Climate Center after several conversations over the last year or so; and we’ve held webinars on this topic.
We spoke with the Dutch. The Dutch are real experts in this area. The Dutch have developed greenhouses Into an art form. The, the Dutch, in a country that has a smaller population than the state of New York, is the second largest exporter of food by dollar volume of sales.
I, in my conversations with Dutch experts, I saw they provided an extremely interesting graphic. They showed the land in cultivation by country; and the United States is number 1. The graph is quite large. The line is quite large, a lot of land in cultivation – number. And then the land in cultivation, for agriculture, for the Netherlands is a small, very tiny line. Then you look at the, the amount of food exports, the dollar value. And that line for the United States, again, is very large. We’re number one; but, then this little country of the Netherlands is number 2. So, as, as I was stating here, they have made smart food production, and we’ll get it into the benefits more so later, a real cornerstone, making them one of the most productive, if not the most productive, food grower in the world.
I’d like to harken back a moment, John, if I can. You and I did a podcast in this series recently and we talked about microgrids. And the reason I bring this up is that the greenhouse is, once again, an opportunity to have local power providing input for a facility. That facility provides significant benefits for the community. That facility being the greenhouse, and, once again, this is a local power opportunity, a microgrid, if you will.
So I will, again, refer to the Dutch. The Dutch have, and I’m going to use some terminology here that you may not be familiar, or your audience may not be familiar with, although your clients probably are, there are four gigawatts. That’s a huge amount of power. A hospital might use five megawatts of power, or 10 megawatts of power; which is, you know, one megawatt is one one thousandth of a gigawatt, and so four gigawatts is, is, is, four times that. Anyway, that they have power right at the greenhouse in many instances across the country. It provides the power to heat the greenhouse, and to cool the greenhouse, and power for the greenhouse for the lighting, and then extra power to the grid. The carbon is captured, sequestered, in large part, not wholly, but is captured by the plants; so it’s a near, not 100%, but a near 0 carbon environment, with the plants taking the CO2 using the CO2 to accelerate plant growth.
And, again, I bring this up because I wanted folks to, once again, think about this microgrid concept or distributed energy concept where you have power, often natural gas, you, generated power. It’s using a fossil fuel. It’s using it in a really smart way. But it’s also providing cooling, heating, power, and in this case, food. So I wanted to lay that out and also refer folks back to this whole concept of microgrid and self-contained, resilient, local power.
07:49 John Krzesicki
Yeah, you had mentioned, uh, smart city or smart technology. How does that fit into smart city environments? Say maybe it’s a, maybe a, you know, a rural community. What would that look like?
08:03 Tom Bourgeois
Well, the interesting thing about, about these technologies, and let’s meet, let’s, let me give it an overarching name. We’ll go beyond the concept of greenhouse. What it’s called, again I’m going to get into some academic talk, but it’s called controlled environmental agriculture, CEA.
And this can be a high-tech greenhouse and the high-tech greenhouse will typically be more of a, uh, suburban, ur.. or rural construct; because this will require 5, 10, 15, 20 acres. This, this will sit on a larger plot of land. But it can also be indoor farming or vertical farming. And indoor or vertical farming can, and is appropriate to more dense or urban environments. You know, this can be done, done in Detroit, you know, in Cleveland, in New York, in Newark, in Buffalo.
This is not one technology; this is a a suite. It can go from, you know, a, a dense vertical area housed within, you know, a, a downtown core. Maybe reusing an old, abandoned manufacturing building in a downtown core for vertical farming. But that has one set of requirements versus a smart, high-tech, IT intensive greenhouse, which would, you know, of the sort often deployed in the Netherlands, which would sit in a different footprint and in a different area. You know, you may have a site that can be developed in an urban area that’s of this scale; but you’re much more likely to have a site like this in suburban, exurban, or rural areas.
This idea fits many different complexes. And it can be utilized by the smart city in the dense, urban context, or it can be utilized by the smart city in the more small city, rural context.
10:13 John Krzesicki
So tell me a little bit about some of the benefits for the greenhouse.
10:16 Tom Bourgeois
I’ll start with the, the dense urban environment first. And some, these are some of the issues that, that we are really concerned with and are looking at as an organization as Pace Energy and Climate Center.
The benefits we see here are many. First of all, we work closely with a number of environmental justice, community development organizations, local, you know, development organizations. We find that there’s a, a real interest, and I won’t go so far as, well, let’s say, uh, in some cases, a crying need for fresh food.
You know, there’s the, this whole aspect of having food deserts; where wholesome, fresh, locally grown food is just not available in, in many areas. And we see this as a potential way this whole concept of controlled environmental agriculture, as being a really smart way to address a variety of problems and to reach a variety of constituencies, including those low-income, moderate-income people who are often left out. So you grow food locally, you provide high quality, fresh, wide variety of, of good substantial food to communities that typically don’t have that readily available to them. So you’re giving them a whole new benefit in terms of a good access to good, nutritious food that they didn’t have before.
We are also seeing this as ways, sensing this as an opportunity to develop local skills, local businesses, local entrepreneurs. I don’t want to get too much into it, but there’s, you know the whole area that’s growing. New York, New Jersey, many states have passed cannabis regulations and rules and, and, you know, this, this allows for, in some instances, the growth of cannabis. But we are also, also, very much looking at growth of, of fresh food; tomatoes, leafy greens, strawberries, peppers. You know, providing both produce as well as, you know, the, the cannabis opportunity is one that, that’s interesting as well.
As we go to more of the suburban area, or, you know, areas where you may be able to find the, the 10, the 15, the 20 acres. This could be used for small cities. It could be used for rural areas that really are lacking in economic development opportunities. Once again, you can provide food locally. You can provide local jobs. We feel that this is something that’s going to be ever more interesting.
Our food system, let me wander a little bit into a more general overview.
In my conversations and explorations here, you know, if you look at the food system, you’ll see these huge arrows. Our food comes up from Central America and Mexico through California and down from Canada. A lot of our food is grown outside of the United States. If we can find smart, effective ways of doing that right here in our communities, not only when we get the benefits of smart, you know, of locally grown and fresh food, but we’ll create local economic development and jobs for communities.
One more thing here I’d like to add, and it’s a bit of a shout out to my colleague. I mentioned that I’m part of the USDoE’s nationwide network of CHP centers. My colleague at Penn State University, Dr. Jim Freihaut, has been exploring this: Pennsylvania is blessed with a huge amount of natural gas resources. And I think that this is a way where we can bring the power generation, people who make power generation equipment and people utilizing and producing natural gas, we can bring, to some extent, their interests in alignment with, clearly in alignment with environmental justice and, and, and environmental organizations.
A greenhouse using combined heat and power, using natural gas, and I think that one of your questions is how would this be powered? — typically with natural gas. But again, we all do want to address climate change. This is just a super smart way to do it, and my, my colleague, Doctor Freihaut, is exploring this at Penn State. The utilization of the natural gas, rich natural gas, assets they have, you know, the power equipment industry, the natural gas industry, the food industry, bringing all these various parties together.
And again, I, I want to also stress that this doesn’t even just lower the carbon footprint. The Dutch have proven, and this is a phrase you’ve probably heard me use before, John, so pardon me, this is clearly an example of it can be done because it has been done. The Dutch have done it. I refer you to YouTube National Geographic stories on this. 90% reduction in water use. It’s so important. You know, we see droughts all over the country. We see droughts hitting California, hitting the Pacific Northwest. You can grow food this way. The Dutch have shown, they’ve demonstrated it. You know, it’s, it’s, It’s not a make-believe.
It’s been proven and in practice for years. 90% reduction in water use. 5 to 10 to 12 times the productivity. You can grow 5, 10, 15 times as much food, you know, on a, an acre of land, as you can with outdoor farming. Virtually no pesticide use.
You reduce the costs of transporting. You know we’re not sending diesel trucks up from San Diego up through California and over to, to New York.
So I wanted to touch on those benefits as well. It, it’s, it’s benefits in water use, lower pesticides, economic, local economic development. And again, John, you know I’ve talked about this before. This becomes an ecosystem. I’m going back to the Dutch because I think, more than anybody, they’ve perfected this; but they’re not alone. This really is an ecosystem.
This brings together, uh, power generation. It brings together really smart utilization of, of gas. It brings together high technology in the utilization of the, you know, how you monitor the temperatures in the greenhouse. So you have advanced controls/smart controls, you have communication, and you have AI, artificial intelligence. You have this iterative feedback of learning. And you have, you know, a broadband or advanced IT needs. And you have optimization algorithms. So, you’re bringing a whole suite or an ecosystem of activities; that include food growing, it includes broadband, it includes AI, it includes optimization algorithms. This is not one thing. This is many things coming together to accomplish a job with maximum efficiency and productivity.
17:37 John Krzesicki
You, you’re absolutely right, Tom. These are conversations we’ve had in the past and, you know, bringing this all together as a, you know definitely could be a value of to any community, whether it’s a large city or rural setting.
So, my next question is: what does the outlook look like for the greenhouses? I know, I know you’ve had some great conversations with, with, with some of your contacts, with Dutch. And so, how do you see this moving in North America or the US? What does the outlook look like?
18:09 Tom Bourgeois
We, we certainly see increasing interest.
Just the other day, in the power generation trade press, there was a notice of a very large greenhouse complex being built.
I was talking to someone about prospects for greenhouses being built in several parts of the, of the country.
I think people are beginning to recognize this opportunity.
This satisfies so many different needs. It’s, it’s the application of local power. It’s that it provides resiliency. It, it introduces resiliency; not only into, into, in the terms of power resiliency, but it introduces food resiliency. It addresses a really important social problem, and that problem is providing high quality, locally grown fresh foods of a variety of different sort, you know, a variety of different types, into urban areas that have not been afforded that opportunity. And then, of course, it meets our increasingly pressing needs for water. It, it, it produces food with, you know, 1/10 of the water requirements. It has so much less pollution from applied pesticides. It, again, provides that additional component of local jobs, community development.
We are seeing this from the holistic point of view. Ideally, we would like to partner with local community development organizations, with local community groups, with smart cities and smart communities, to explore how you can do skills training, how you can provide public/private partnerships. How you can provide interesting financial arrangements, public/private financing to catalyze, uh, wholly owned or partially community-owned, enterprises that would provide local development for local communities, local skills training and using both our renewable resources and our gas resources in an extremely smart and in an integrated way.
And, once again, I’d like to point out that I think this provides a way to harmonize interests. Again, it harmonizes interests between power equipment producers and, and gas, natural gas. If done smart, if done in a highly, you know, high productivity way, if done with carbon capture and carbon reuse, this is including renewables, and perhaps, in the future, including a renewable fuel source for the power gen equipment, you know, hydrogen — which some of the, the power equipment industry is, is, you know, looking at 100% hydrogen fueled equipment. We’ve had some webinars on that topic as well.
There are examples in, in, in, you know, in effect right now of combined heat and power using reciprocating engines running on 100% hydrogen in Germany and in the UAE.
John, this, this, I think, brings together interests across many different groups.
It’s a smart way to use our remaining gas resources for the, you know, to provide food, to provide power, to provide resiliency. All of these things in one broad ecosystem.
As we’ve stated before, and we, we stated this with microgrids, because we’re talking about an ecosystem, a system that often includes several users. It incorporates many different technologies that could incorporate storage, and broadband, and IT, and AI, and power gen equipment. And also, you know, hot water and chilled water piping. It’s, it, it’s a really is an ecosystem. It is one that really needs to flourish.
We need to strategically look at our current market frameworks and our regulatory systems. So, I urge people to consider, you know, this, this is something that requires a restructuring, in some ways, of how we think; because it is a multi-technology ecosystem.
You and I talked about how important it is to reward outcomes and not reward technologies. As much as, you know, we want to see the acceleration of particular, you know, totally renewable technologies. Oftentimes, say states and cities looked at, you know, they reward a PV panel, they reward a, a battery. That’s great; but more comprehensively, you know, if we think about rewarding an outcome; how much carbon was reduced, how much, you know, water usage, how much criteria pollutants? If you think about it in this more holistic way, and I know I’m speaking to, you know, smart cities and I’m speaking to a kind of a broader audience, including, you know, people in the power gen industry, how do we reward an outcome is, I think, how we should be thinking about this, whether we’re a city, whether a state, whether, whether we’re the federal government. Because in order for this to really flourish, the kinds of systems and the rewards need to be based on, on, on outcomes, measured outcomes, rather than, you know, payment for a particular piece of technology.
So I, I did want to put that out there. The importance of, uh, the need to create new market frameworks and the need to look at city, state and federal regulations and incentives and how they can help facilitate this smart ecosystem of the future.
24:15 John Krzesicki
Yeah, we did, uh, just to summarize, we did have that conversation and it was definitely eye opening to me and way, in a different way of thinking about of how we can use the outcome to make the ecosystem to be more innovative. Like you said earlier, how do we take advantage of the technologies, the different, you know, methodologies, the different energy sources. And how do we become creative to, to get that final outcome? Because in the end, that’s the importance… is the final outcome and how that impacts that community, that city, that environment.
24:46 Tom Bourgeois
One final point. I want to mention this because the greenhouse is an example. Zero carbon technologies, I’m again talking about my own state, get rewarded, you know wind, and solar, and then in other states as well. A greenhouse may be providing the same service. You know, if, if you’re using natural gas, but if, you know, 70%, 75% of the carbon is being captured, you are effectively achieving the same result; and that’s why I’m trying to make this concrete about what I’m saying. You know, perhaps we ought to be thinking about rewarding systems that achieve the same result that we want.
With that I will conclude, but I wanted to give a concrete example as to what our thinking is here and why we think it’s so important to, to reward outcomes.
25:36 John Krzesicki
Well, I totally agree with you, Tom. Totally agree with you.
So, this concludes our conversation today.
Tom, again, thank you for your time. I really appreciate your time and insight and knowledge in the greenhouse industry and technology and where it’s going and looking forward to, you know, more conversations.
25:52 Tom Bourgeois
Thank you very much, John. This has been a great opportunity for us. Take care.
25:55 John Krzesicki
All right. Thank you.
25:56
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