Heating the Harnois way

Photo courtesy of Industries Harnois

Industries Harnois, a Canadian company manufacturing steel structures (greenhouses and fabric building), recently celebrated 55 years in the industry. Over that time, it has introduced new products, services and systems. One offering it has presented is its broad selection of greenhouse heating systems.

“At Harnois Greenhouses, we provide turnkey solutions integrating heating system, and have a team of experts that take into consideration different parameters to perform the best solution and approach,” says Corenthin (Félix) Chassouant, sales director of North America.

When it comes to heating, Harnois provides systems with hot water distribution or air heaters, and heat generators that are adapted to various fuel types including natural gas, propane, biomass, fuel oil and electricity. When curating a heating system for growers, Chassouant says its team of experts analyze important factors such as budget, crops (biological), availability/cost of energy, efficiency and required space to implement the solution. They also consider the growers’ capabilities and experience using a natural gas, propane or biomass system, for example.

For the past several weeks, heating expenses have been at the forefront of growers' conversations about rising energy costs.

“Our greenhouse equipment experts have developed tools to accurately analyze the heating needs of our clients,” Chassouant says. “Indeed, we consider factors such as the daytime temperatures at the project site, potential loss by convection, conduction, air infiltration and other parameters to refine our heating recommendations. In addition, we are also able to propose the most appropriate type of cloth for your thermal screen system in order to save on energy cost.”

These measures are taken into account because an efficient heating system is one of the most important steps for successful plant production, Chassouant explains.

“Heating is very important because in some parts of the States, you cannot propagate year-round without a heating system. It will provide uniformity without releasing harmful materials,” he adds. “And a good heating system is a perfect way to provide optimal growing conditions such as temperature, humidity and, in some cases, carbon dioxide.”

Besides the success that follows it, Félix recommends heating systems from Harnois because of their cohesive methods that work with other components of the company like the greenhouse design and model selection.

“What makes us different is our integrated solutions,” Chassouant says. “We have the experts, and our greenhouse heating solutions offer optimal performance. We have quality structures, engineers and a wide range of technologies to enhance production.”