PHOTO: IFIP
MANAGEMENT ▶▶▶
A model to adapt buildings to climate
Hotter summers and colder winters can both impair pig production. As a result, pig house designs which once used to be suitable are now being questioned. Adaptations in terms of barn structure, equipment and management need to be evaluated. In the PigSys project, IFIP and INRAE scientists developed a model-based tool for such multicriteria evaluation.
BY DR NATHALIE QUINIOU, MICHEL MARCON AND DR LUDOVIC BROSSARD*
Room that was used to validate the model in the IFIP experimen- tal station. The climate control system includes control of the fans and the heaters.
A
mbient conditions (temperature, hygrometry) have a major influence on grow-finishing pig per- formance. Due to genetic selection for leaner ani- mals with reduced appetite, pigs are increasingly
sensitive to ambient temperature outside their thermoneutral zone.
Under cold temperatures, pigs use some dietary energy to regulate body temperature at the expense of growth and feed efficiency. Exposure to hot temperatures induces a de- crease in feed consumption and growth rate, even more so under wet conditions. Pigs are reared indoors to mitigate outdoor condition effects on performance. However, climate conditions are changing; for instance, heat waves were observed repeatedly in late
spring or summer in the last few years. These epi- sodes impaired performance and increased loss rates. Techni- cal choices for barn configuration need to be revised. Equip- ment, insulation and regulations are questioned for both existing and new buildings. Changes in technical choices and management have to be proposed and evaluated regarding criteria such as technical and economic performance as well as energy consumption.
Simulating impacts of technical choices Combinations of wall insulation, available equipment, regula- tion rules and pig management strategies are too numerous to evaluate well on-farm. Therefore, the tool “ThermiPig” was developed. This modelling approach virtually represents the functioning of a finishing room and of a group of pigs reared indoors. ThermiPig allows the dynamic simulation of room thermal balance depending on outdoor climate conditions, room characteristics, regulation rules of climate control boxes and management of pigs. It is then possible to evaluate the consequences of indoor conditions on finishing pigs’ perfor- mance, nutrient excretion into the environment, electric power consumption, etc. and to perform multicriteria report- ing allowing comparison of various technical sets of options. ThermiPig is merging two models. On one hand, the InraPorc model, originally designed by the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE) to simu- late pig growth under thermoneutral conditions; on the oth- er, the bioclimatic model ThermiSim, designed by the French Pork and Pig Institute (IFIP), that allows simulation of the thermal balance at the room scale depending on incoming
52 ▶ PIG PROGRESS | Volume 37, No. 2, 2021
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