Great Lakes Greenhouses enhances cucumber production with Philips

Signify (Euronext: LIGHT), the world leader in lighting, has provided Great Lakes Greenhouses, North America's largest grower, shipper, and packer of hydroponic cucumbers, with the Philips GreenPower LED toplighting compact and Philips GreenPower toplighting linear fixtures, combined with the innovative Philips GrowWise Control Systems (GWCS). This enables Great Lakes Greenhouses to manage energy expenditures using custom light recipes while also improving their cucumber production.

Maximum Control and Efficiency

Great Lakes Greenhouses, spanning over 100 acres in Leamington, Ontario, initially engaged with the Philips horticulture team in 2021 for a sizeable installation of Philips GreenPower LED interlighting in several ranges of cucumber production. Shortly thereafter, the Great Lakes team started evaluating opportunities to install additional supplemental lighting. Mark Reimer, Research and Business Development Manager, explained: “we started looking for a lighting fixture that supported our goal of ensuring the health of our crop while offering maximum efficiency and control. This brought us to the dimmable toplighting compact paired with the GrowWise Control.”

In addition to the flexibility that the toplighting compact offers, Reimer and his team were influenced by the superiority of the toplighting fixture: “We are impressed by the quality of the toplighting compact. It’s sturdy and robust. It offers an exceptional heat sink, and we achieve higher uniformity while delivering the right light level and intensity to the crop, which means consistent and quality production”

Dimmable Lighting Solutions for Optimal Efficiency

The integration of GWCS with the LED toplighting fixtures provides Great Lakes Greenhouses with unparalleled flexibility and control over their lighting systems. GWCS enhances crop quality, productivity, and operational efficiency by seamlessly connecting to climate control and greenhouse management systems, simplifying operations. Chris Tawil, IT and Special Projects Manager at Great Lakes, who leads the GWCS installation and support, praised the system's reliability, stating: "The system is designed with redundancy to ensure no disruption to our crop cycles, even in the event of a power outage."

The GrowWise Control Systems, first introduced in 2018, enables users to easily create and run custom light recipes using Philips horticulture dimmable LED modules including the toplighting compact, linear, force and production module. With custom light recipes, growers can steer specific plant characteristics, such as compactness, color intensity, branch development and flowering while driving energy efficiency. GWCS is a robust and complex system with a high level of functionality. Tawil also commented,GWCS is “a very complex system but with a lot of ease of use; anyone can use it from the owner of the company to a general labourer. It’s stable, and we value the quality and reliability of the product and we’re happy with the support of the team.”

Comprehensive Partnership

The collaboration between Great Lakes Greenhouses and Signify extends beyond product installation. Mark Reimer: “Philips Horticulture' team of plant specialists works closely with our head growers and assistant growers to address not only lighting-specific issues but also general horticultural challenges. This hands-on support ensures that greenhouse operations are optimized for both current and future needs.”

Ries Neuteboom, Commercial Leader of Philips Horticulture North America team said, “we are happy to have earned the trust of the Great Lakes team following their positive experience with our interlighting and later, our toplighting compact and GWCS. Our unique triangle approach, which involves plant specialists and application engineers, ensures that the Great Lakes team will continue to enjoy the full benefits of this installation. We are proud to be a part of their success and look forward to continuing our partnership with them.”

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