Applicability of Solar Evaporative Cooling in Greenhouses productivity Improvement

Abstract

One of the main objectives of growing crops in a greenhouse is to extend the productive life of plants and to produce yields when this is not feasible in open field agriculture due to extreme ambient conditions. The energy consumed by cooling systems to reduce the greenhouse temperature comes basically from power plant using natural gas, which has direct impact on the environment. The refrigerants used in these systems have a varying degree of global warming and ozone depletion potentials, which also have a direct impact on our environment. Evaporative coolers are an excellent alternative which could be the future trends in greenhouse cooling in hot and dry climate, which is basically the two third area of the country. Also, well designed evaporative coolers have very low energy consumption, and the fluids used have no impact whatsoever on our environment. The cooling device uses hundred percent (100%) outside air, which is excellent for greenhouses ventilation requirements. In the present work, we will study the applicability of two devices, the two stage solar evaporative cooler and the solar liquid desiccant cooler in different weather conditions and investigate the various possibilities of its uses in agricultural applications.