Awards issued prior to january 20, 2025, were funded under previous administrations and may not reflect the priorities and policies of the current administration.** given the rising demand for food…

Awards issued prior to january 20, 2025, were funded under previous administrations and may not reflect the priorities and policies of the current administration.** given the rising demand for food due to rapid population growth, greenhouses have become one of the most common on-farm facilities. However, conventional commercial greenhouses use fossil fuel energy for heating, contributing to agriculture's carbon footprint and suffering from low energy efficiency, short lifespans, and high maintenance costs. The long-term goal of this project is to develop a zero-energy greenhouse using solar and geothermal energy. Building integrated photovoltaic-thermal (BIPVT) panels for the roofing system and phase change material (PCM) based underground heat storage/dissipation system will be used for supplemental lighting and temperature/moisture control of the greenhouse. The proposed technology will significantly improve energy harvesting efficiency with solar and geothermal energy, create controlled indoor environments with self-powered smart sensing, and enhance farm production through optimized plant-environmental interaction. The research program will validate following hypotheses: 1) optimizing energy harvesting and supplemental lighting for higher yield in the greenhouse; 2) achieving seasonal heat storage through a geothermal system for greenhouse operation, and; 3) utilization of solar and geothermal energy which may lead to affordable net zero-energy greenhouse technologies. The success of this project will immediately create new research areas and applications in energy sustainability of agricultural systems. The proposed greenhouse technology exhibits the following benefits:1) energy and economic benefits: the BIPVT panel our team developed provides a viable solution to significantly increase the overall energy efficiency (e.g., PV efficiency enhanced by >20%) while harvesting solar heat. These benefits will eventually translate to each one of US as food consumers.2) environmental benefits: the proposed greenhouse uses clean solar energy and IT is self-sustaining. Other energy resources (either renewable or non-renewable) might be only necessary for maintenance or emergences. The green technology we proposed in this project is essential to expedite the process of shifting from energy-intensive agriculture to sustainable agriculture, which will reduce carbon footprints and alleviate global warming.3) technical benefits: the innovative BIPVT-geothermal systems integrated with smart sensing and control units proposed in this project not only apply for greenhouses, they can also be adapted to many other civil infrastructures such as residential or commercial buildings, shading structures, rigid or flexible pavements, parking lots, swimming pools.4) social benefits and policy changes: the energy-sustaining solar greenhouses will be examples: (a) to encourage the agricultural sector to promote improved energy efficiency and conservation in farm operations; (B) to educate the general public how to develop better ways to utilize renewable energy sources for food production and other applications. The popularization of these advanced greenhouse technologies can prompt positive changes in energy policies related to the agricultural sector and consequently other agriculture-related departments, which would work as a starting point of a healthy and more sustainable energy circle for all human-involved activities.