Whitepaper Outlines How LED Dynamic Lighting Contributes to Pest Management

Sollum TechnologiesThe effects of greenhouse lighting on pests can be immense. According to suppliers of biologicals for pest control and pollination, adding supplemental lighting to your greenhouse can double the required amounts.

There are multiple reasons behind this, one of them being that supplemental light boosts crop performance, which may attract more pests. Also, supplemental lighting allows growers to plant in the late summer/early fall when pest pressure outdoors is naturally high.

Advertisement

Despite the higher costs of biologicals, the increased yield and product quality under supplemental lighting makes it worthwhile. However, lighting strategies need to consider the potential impacts on the activity of pests and biological control agents.

Late last year, Sollum Technologies introduced a whitepaper that focuses on integrated pest management (IPM), how dynamic lighting can be another weapon in the IPM toolkit, and the relationship between supplemental lighting, pest insects and mites, and biological control agents.

“As the greenhouse industry turns to more dynamic lighting, we want be sure that we’re using it to its full potential,” says Rose Seguin, an agronomist at Sollum. “We need to be looking at all of the things in the greenhouse that are affected by light, and that includes insects. If we’re changing the spectrum in the greenhouse or if we’re changing any other light conditions, we also might be having an effect on how insects and biologicals move in the greenhouse.”

Top Articles
Why This Hydrangea From Green Fuse Botanicals Is a Gamechanger (Video)

This includes both problematic pests like thrips, as well as predators such as Orius. Seguin says Sollum is looking at seasonal timing, and how predators released in the greenhouse during cooler months, when more lighting might also be in use, are performing.

Looking ahead, one of the goals of Sollum’s research is to actually use lights as a means of managing pests.

“If we see a particular outbreak or infestation in one part of the greenhouse, can we change the lighting conditions over that area to slow the spread?” Seguin says. “I think with pathogens, it might be a bit easier because insects are very mobile. But if we can identify an infestation, we would like to limit its spread.”

Learn more and download the whitepaper here.

Sollum Adds Funding

In related news, Sollum recently closed a $30 million financing round, including $25 million from Idealist Capital, a private equity manager that supports entrepreneurs at the heart of energy transition and decarbonization, and $5 million from Fondaction, a partner of innovative Québec SMEs, and more specifically those with added social, environmental and economic value.

Sollum offers greenhouse growers a technology that has become the standard for fully dynamic smart LED lighting. In 2022, the company launched a line of lighting fixtures to meet the diverse needs and business models of greenhouse growers, whether they are large-scale growers looking for a solution that combines cost, productivity, and sustainability, or grow specialty products that require ultimate light spectrum flexibility. Whatever their choice, greenhouse growers benefit from the Sun as a Service cloud platform, powered by artificial intelligence and the support of a team of experienced engineers, technicians, and agronomists.

“Our technological approach allows us to be competitive and deploy our solution in large-scale greenhouses,” says Louis Brun, President and CEO of Sollum. “This capital contribution will allow us to accelerate our penetration of a growing market by enhancing the competitiveness of our solution, and its flexibility through the addition of a multitude of spectral recipes.”

1