Iowa greenhouse utilizes industrial heat

Nestled behind a nondescript factory in Fairfield, Iowa, is a fairly revolutionary greenhouse, run by Jan Swinton.

The facility is growing produce for the area's 1,700 schoolchildren. Omaha.com reports that "Swinton is growing veggies by tapping unused heat from her neighbor, Schaus-Vorhies Kleaning (run by Mark Burnham), a company that uses heat up to 1,600 degrees to clean and sometimes strengthen metals."

The article continues: Swinton uses water, piped underground, to capture the heat at Burnham's company and carry it back into a 17,000-gallon tank, where it heats the greenhouse soil to 60 to 70 degrees."

For more info, or to read the whole article, visit Omaha.com.