Cannabis cultivation facilities require specialized engineering

Summit Steel Buildings has extensive cannabis building experience

What makes cannabis facility construction unique is the need for logistical capabilities most normal buildings do not require. The list of considerations is incredibly detailed. Here are a few of the challenges that need to be taken into account:

1. Building size must be calculated specifically for future needs – It’s no surprise that growing cannabis plants requires more space. They can grow up to six feet in height and almost as much wide. Production space must account for future growth, both in plant and crop size, to avoid creating conditions that may limit healthy production. Plants, like people, need adequate space to develop into their full potential. Overcrowding creates a canopy that limits growth and hinders access to the plants, limiting upkeep. These elements of grower input often inform market share and potential profits. All this added space, while good for the plants, requires more infrastructure and budget considerations. These factors need to be considered when deciding how large of a facility to build. Fortunately, pre-engineered metal buildings are designed to expand quickly and affordably to evolve with your growing business.

2. Creating an optimal environment to nurture plants requires specialized systems – Dedicated cannabis-growing buildings need extensive, specialized environmental systems. The building must be purposefully constructed to meet these requirements in advance. One of the first essential systems is a powerful and reliable power supply and wiring to support it. Power needs in cannabis growing facilities are dramatically different than those of normal buildings. It’s an equipment- and systems- heavy environment with many potentially variable elements. Power systems require vastly greater amounts of energy and produce an immense amount of heat that needs to be dispersed effectively so it doesn’t affect the growing environment. Your facility must be built with these needs in mind as retrofitting is going to become much more time-consuming and expensive. Furthermore, stringent government regulations around expansion make having a well-planned facility more efficient, especially for producers that may not have as much immediate cash flow or access to capital. Pre-engineered steel buildings create less need for revisions due to unexpected variables.

If the building is the body of the operation, then lighting is its soul. Regardless of which type of lighting systems are installed (i.e., incandescent bulbs, high-intensity discharge lamps, LEDs or fluorescents), your building is built with the required high-demand electrical and lighting structures to support them. Temperature must be strictly maintained when lighting is both on and off and be able to change throughout the plants’ growth cycle, from germination to flowering and harvesting. Humidity controls, exhaust fans and air filtering systems are necessary for good air circulation to help moderate temperatures throughout. For this purpose, Summit Steel Buildings’ custom designs use R-30 or R-40 insulation in their building construction along with dehumidification and CO2 monitoring systems. Irrigation and pumping systems with steady access to water supply are essential, as is the proper floor drainage to help balance humidity levels. These serve to benefit operations through cost reduction, increased yield size and availability.

3. Don’t forget about easy to maintain hygiene and security measures – As a supplier to the cannabis industry, you need sanitary and secure facilities with the optimal conditions to grow your crops while protecting them from the outside environment. Easy-to-clean concrete floors and steel walls ensure your production is stored safely within a secure and pest-free environment that helps you achieve and maintain an advantage. In fact, metal building construction requires little overall maintenance. They keep their look and do not crack or rot like other building materials, which removes one major contributing factor to insect infestation and the development of sickness within your crop. Such situations can add a significant cost in treatments or, at an extreme, force the destruction of the entire yield. Steel cannabis facilities are easy to clean; with flexible and effective drainage to help prevent stagnant water that can lead to rot and become breeding grounds for pests.

Security is a major factor in an industry that faces such immense consumer demand. Having invested significant capital into production, securing your product is a logical concern for producers. Steel construction protects your environment against outside intrusion and theft. All areas of the building contain strong steel security with locked doors and biometric access to provide complete control over entry. Wiring for security cameras and other biometric controls are built into the construction to offer the flexibility to limit access to certain areas. A safe and pristine growing environment will allow producers to focus on quality and quantity of healthy yields rather than on safety and environmental challenges.

Don’t settle for generic buildings for your cannabis cultivation facility

Creating the optimal growing environment requires much more than four walls, electricity and access to water. Cannabis construction requires a skilled combination of engineering and understanding your business. Commercial cultivation is a complicated combination of environmental systems to produce climate-controlled, man-made rainforest inside a metal building. The ideal ecosystem involves a diverse set of engineering expertise that are best gained from extensive learning, training and experience. Many companies can build warehouses, but you don’t want to trust your future operation to anyone unless they have dedicated experience building steel buildings specifically for the cannabis industry. That’s why you need to partner with Summit Steel Buildings.

Be it medical marijuana distribution or a commercial cannabis cultivation, you can rely on Summit Steel Buildings to create your ideal indoor crop facility. Our steel buildings help you save up to 50% over any traditional wood or brick buildings. We provide pre-engineered, turnkey packages to design and build your business needs. Our approach to offering pre-designed, pre-engineered facilities streamlined for cannabis growing allows for rapid development and quicker time to market. Our custom-designed facilities can be erected and permitted more expeditiously than a traditional build or retrofit. Because our projects are predesigned and pre-engineered, our building projects have more predictable timelines, known materials and costs to mitigate risk and interruptions. Our team of architects, engineers, project managers and builders will take you from concept to operational launch quicker. The result is a cannabis facility built for your unique cannabis operations needs. Contact Summit Steel Buildings today to get started.

About the author

Frank Melo has a construction engineering and business background with over 25 years of experience as a business owner and contractor. He was born in the Azores on the island of São Miguel and moved to London, Ontario at the age of two. After studying architecture, Frank graduated from Fanshawe College’s civil engineering technology program. He divides his time between projects primarily in Ontario and British Columbia. Frank can be contacted at Summit Steel Buildings at (778) 951-4766, by email at frank.melo@summitsteelbuildings.com or you can connect with him on LinkedIn.