Greenhouses

By:

Marije Bergmans

Lena Peters

Irene van Leeuwen

Renée van Holsteijn

“Het Westland” is well known all over the world as the city of glass. The products, such as flowers, plants, tomatoes and other vegetables and fruits, that are produced here are being sold and transported not only in Holland and Europe, but also in Japan and other parts of the world.

To create the perfect environment to produce all these organic products, a lot of energy and especially water is needed. To explain how the process works we’ll give you the example of cherry tomatoes on the vine, as they are produced in the Looije company.

They importance of water for the greenhouses to begin with is huge. After all, without water, no life can exist. In South Holland the water is under the commitment of Delfland, one of the 53 “hoogheemraadschappen” in Holland. They are responsible for the quality of the water and the dikes etc. In het Westland, 95% of the water comes through underground pipelines from the Brielse Lake too the greenhouses. The Brielse Lake itself is being floated with water from the Bernisse in the Spij. In this side of Holland, water is stored in the Haringvliet, which also works as a system to control the quantity of the water. An other part of the water being used in the greenhouses is rainwater, stored in basins next to the greenhouses. Most gardeners own one themselves. The water is not only used to drain the plants, but also to control the temperature and clean the greenhouse.

The Looije company usually uses rainwater. In extremely dry periods, they use water from “de Kaag”, a trench or canal near their greenery. The water is constantly drained into the rockwool pieces. This is to create the perfect environment. We have seen this process on Tuesday, and we find it really interesting. We would like to thank mister Looije, for his effort