This is probably not something you tend to give much thought to on a daily basis. After all, these systems have been in use in the glasshouse horticulture sector for more than 40 years. Yet it is worthwhile reviewing the situation from time to time, especially where greenhouses are newly constructed, or your climate computer is already several years old. After all, we are talking about the heart of the business here, and that heart must keep beating in good health.

Optimum climate in the greenhouse
Insight into the process
Nursery map
Energy saving
Peace of mind
Helpdesk

Accessories for your process computer
Econaut: Saving energy without loss of production and quality

Optimum climate in the greenhouse
Hoogendoorn soon recognised the need to involve the changing conditions outside in the control process. After all, there is nothing stable about the weather and it can have a major impact on the conditions inside the greenhouse. An optimum greenhouse climate forms the basis for maximum production and the best possible quality of the products harvested. This could not be achieved if the computer was constantly behind the times.

Insight into the process
With the Economic you can retrieve settings and overviews by section, heating unit or valve section. Then you can compile the overviews you want yourself. The same applies to the overviews that you want to see regularly. Insight into the process improves appreciably when you throw all the ballast overboard.

Nursery map
In the Economic each user works with a map of their own nursery. This tells you about the present conditions in the part of your nursery that you click on the screen. At the same time it gives you an opportunity to make any adjustments you want.
You decide for yourself what you want to compare in overviews and graphs. This facility and its graphical presentation ensure that you have a better understanding of the processes in your nursery. Incidentally, the storage capacity for relevant data is almost unlimited.

Energy saving
Using the Economic, equipped with the latest programs such as Econaut and Energy Management, you can achieve substantial savings of up to 25%. Your high return on cultivation will certainly not be weighed down by this.

Peace of mind
Apart from the simplicity and clarity of the Economic, the thorough education and training programme also means that any uncertainty soon turns to satisfaction with the choice of Economic. Experience shows that growers who switch to a different make of climate computer have some reservations about going over to a completely new way of regulating. Hoogendoorn proves in practice that it can soon deal with these reservations.

Helpdesk
The Helpdesk is available 24 hours a day to answer your questions. This team of specialists can help you with all your questions about Economic, Nomad and Growlab.

Accessories for the Economic
Your Economic can be expanded with a number of useful programs. One such program automatically closes your windows if a storm is imminent, while another keeps your energy consumption as economic as possible.

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Econaut: Saving energy without loss of production and quality

Econaut is a program that provides for an optimum heating regime for more than one day. The latest version of Econaut does this in such a way that you will have a crop with maximum activity. Econaut applies the knowledge that it is not necessary for the growth and development of most plants to maintain a given temperature exactly at all times. Plants react much better and more actively to an average temperature over a given period. This is called temperature integration.

Econaut avoids peaks
Econaut thinks ahead
Econaut customised
Econaut does what you want
Econaut saves

Ecoanut avoids peaks
The energy costs for the achievement of a given heating curve depend on the external conditions. With a low outside temperature and more wind more energy is needed to maintain a given greenhouse temperature. Econaut saves energy and provides for peak smoothing. The program does this by combining the temperature integration of the plant and the variations in the weather-dependent energy costs in an intelligent manner. In favourable weather conditions a higher greenhouse temperature is chosen, in adverse conditions a lower temperature. A greenhouse and crop model is used for this.

Econaut thinks ahead
Econaut calculates the optimum heating curve over the number of days that you have set. For this Econaut uses the weather forecast for a maximum of seven days. This weather forecast is put together by Meteo Consult specifically for your greenhouse location. The forecast is retrieved automatically several times a day. Econaut displays the whole profile in clear graphs. In this way you have a perfect and clear means at your disposal of seeing the energy offtake pattern to be expected.

Econaut customised
The Econaut program responds to the specific conditions of your nursery. It could be factors such as the size or method of growing the crop (cutting or crop on the wire), but also specific greenhouse properties (such as the light permeability of the greenhouse roof, heating capacity, type of curtains, etc). Econaut works with heating and ventilation controls and takes account of the setting of curtains, minimum pipes and lighting.

Econaut does what you want
The main thing is that you yourself keep control of everything at all times. You decide for yourself how great the bandwidth may be and for how many days ahead. You decide the minimum and maximum heating temperatures and the set point of the integration temperature. In this regard the history is included in the determination of the temperature sum, expressed in degree-hours. A settable DIF control has been incorporated to effect the day/night difference.

Econaut saves
Research with Econaut by PBG and Novem shows that the possible saving on energy costs through weather forecast-based temperature integration in averaged Dutch weather conditions can amount to 25% on an annual basis. Self-evidently the energy saving and the smoothing of the peaks will depend on the crop, the cultivation method, the permissible minimum and maximum limits for the integration and the properties of the greenhouse. Econaut ensures that you heat at pre-determined energy-efficient times.

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