Grow Sessions

Stephen Lafaille of Tecogen joins Tony P for an informative discussion about minimizing your carbon footprint in our new episode entitled, "Energy Demands of Cannabis Cultivation - How to Minimize Your Carbon Footprint."

The energy needs for indoor cannabis cultivation facilities are immense, especially their density. There is an extreme amount of energy needed per sq. ft. and this results in a relatively small building (minimal roof area), but a very high power need. This makes addressing power consumption with solar, not very feasible, unless you have a lot of empty land surrounding the building (most people do not).

Ultimately this means until the power coming from our central utility grid is 100% renewable, or at least more than about 5-20% depending on what state you are in, growers need to look to other ways to reduce their carbon footprint. CHP (Combined Heat and Power) is a great way to do this, because not only does it offer a carbon footprint reduction for the building, it also saves the owners a lot of money on their utility bills. This is a great combination of doing what’s right for your business financially, and at the same time having a positive impact on the planet.

Listen now to learn more about CHP products and how CHP can help reduce the carbon footprint in cannabis cultivation facilities. Interesting topic just in time for Earth Day!

About Stephen Lafaille and Tecogen

Stephen Lafaille, PE
Vice President of Business Development, Tecogen

Stephen Lafaille is the Vice President of Business Development for Tecogen Inc. Tecogen is a leading manufacturer of Combined Heat and Power (CHP) products including natural gas engine-driven generators, chillers, and refrigeration packages for commercial and industrial use.

Steve is responsible for developing new business relationships to help grow Tecogen’s awareness and sales, allowing Tecogen to maintain its reputation as the leader in advanced CHP systems. Steve has been with the company for over ten years and started in the engineering group as a product development engineer. 

In addition to his business development efforts, Steve works closely with salespeople, manufacturer’s representatives, and customers to provide product and application technical support, and performs detailed economic feasibility analyses, and helps close sales. Steve represents the company directly to customers, such as hospitals, schools, colleges, multi-family housing, and industrial manufacturing facilities such as cannabis cultivation. He also works closely with utilities who provide energy efficiency incentives to many of Tecogen’s customers.

Steve has a B.S. and M.S. from the University of New Hampshire both in Mechanical Engineering. Steve is also a registered Professional Engineer in the State of Massachusetts.

For a closer look at Tecogen, please visit: www.tecogen.com

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Mike Sarro of RX Green Technologies joins Tony P for an informative discussion about cultivation in this week’s episode entitled, “Moisture Management and Cannabis Plant Health.” Some of the topics in this episode include: How Environment Affects Cannabis Plant Health and Proper Dry Down, Tips if There is Lockout and Excess Nutrients, Types of Media and the Effect on Plants, Moisture Readings, The Five Keys to Plant Health, Nutrient Uptake and much, much more. If you are a cultivator, facility owner or anyone interested in growing, you won’t want to miss this episode.

More About Mike Sarro, Plant Specialist, RX Green Technologies

Mike Sarro comes from a diverse business, technology and science background. Prior to joining the industry, he spent 10+ years working with both amateur and elite athletes performing 1000’s of hours of testing on how key minerals, carbs, fats, proteins and rest enhance athletic performance.

When the industry was coming of age commercially back in 2012 he knew his technical skills and experience in exercise physiology would cross over to plant physiology as he saw a strong correlation between human cells and plants cells.

Over the last six years covering markets in the Eastern US and Canada, he manages over 2.5 million square feet of cannabis cultivation including indoor, outdoor and greenhouse canopies with all media and lighting conditions as a Plant Specialist with RX Green Technologies.

RX Green Technologies specializes in Nutrients, IPM and Media with over 6.5 million square feet of commercial cultivation on its regimen.

Rx Green Technologies, is dedicated to designing products for testing. Our robust product testing platform allows us to deliver solutions for  growers that are easy to use and drive results in commercial operations. We conduct trials on all aspects of product performance, generating insights that allow you to maximize your plant’s performance via our solutions. For a closer look at our R&D visit: https://www.rxgreentechnologies.com/about/rd/

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