JPH08289684A - Plant raising facility - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide a plant raising facility capable of controlling energy cost to low levels. CONSTITUTION: A 1st compartment 100 for plant hydroponics is fed with a nutrient fluid consisting of fertilizer-contg. water. The nutrient fluid is then guided to the outside of the 1st compartment 100, i.e., a 2nd compartment 200 where a part of the fluid is evaporated to effect cooling the fluid by the heat of vaporization. The cooled nutrient fluid is guided to the 1st compartment 100 and set to be served as a cooling medium for cooling the space of the compartment 100. If a 3rd compartment 300 is provide above and adjacently to the 1st compartment 100 in an air-permeable manner, air raised in its temperature is allowed to flow from the 1st compartment 100 into the 3rd compartment 300, resulting in cooling the 1st compartment 100. If the 2nd compartment 200 is provided adjacently to the 3rd compartment 300 through a wall 305 of good thermal conductivity, further reduction of space cooling energy cost becomes possible synergistically with the above effect.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a so-called plant factory, and more particularly to a completely controlled plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating plants in a closed space with a nutrient solution containing water containing fertilizer. .

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art A hydroponic cultivation facility for plants has advantages such as rapid growth of plants and high work intensity. In particular,
As will be described later, in addition to the above advantages, the fully-controlled hydroponic facility has high productivity, can control or predict the number of cultivation days and is easy to make a production plan, and can prevent pesticides and disease-free pests. It is known to have the feature of high added value.

The main problem of the above-mentioned conventional plant cultivation facilities is the cost of energy required for operation, and an important part thereof is the cooling cost for coping with the high temperature in summer. Therefore, increasing the efficiency of cooling is the biggest problem for plant cultivation hydroponics facilities. The high temperature in summer is dealt with by deploying a dimmer sheet to prevent sunlight from entering in a facility using ordinary sunlight (a so-called glass greenhouse house, etc.). However, it also weakens the wavelength of light that is beneficial to plants, which is a big disadvantage.

On the other hand, the fully controlled facility is a hydroponic cultivation facility that uses artificial light illumination without using sunlight, and therefore has a well-insulated wall and is capable of invading heat in summer and in winter. Prevents heat loss. In addition, since carbon dioxide is applied to increase the growth rate, the airtightness is relatively good. This is also effective for preventing warm and cold air from interacting with the outside and preventing pests from entering. In this case, the structure of the building will be referred to as a substantially closed structure or a semi-airtight structure.

[0005]

With the quasi-airtight structure, the influence of temperature fluctuations in the outside world does not affect the inside throughout the four seasons, and therefore a good environment can be maintained. However, since the interior has a heat source for artificial lighting, the rise in internal temperature is unavoidable, especially in summer, but as the only drawback. Therefore, conventionally, a cooling device such as an ice maker and a heat pump has been used together. As described above, in the plant cultivation facility, the cooling cost in summer has always been an important issue, and a method for reducing the cooling cost has been desired.

By the way, as a conventional simple cooling method, for example, there is an evaporative cooling method. Usually, water is made into a fine mist, and the air cooled through this is sent into the facility by a blower. It is well known that the cooling characteristics are determined by the enthalpy curve of water, and it has been known that the temperature can be lowered by about 7 ° C from the outside temperature if the conditions are good in summer. This is a low cost and practical method.

However, the problem with this evaporative cooling method is that the humidity inside the facility increases, and more specifically, the cooling efficiency decreases as the humidity increases, so if the conditions deteriorate. It means losing the effect. In addition, it also has the drawback that airtightness cannot be maintained.

Therefore, the present invention solves this drawback and improves the facility utilizing the conventional evaporative cooling method to realize highly efficient and inexpensive cooling.

[0009]

The present invention provides a completely controlled plant cultivation facility for hydroponically growing a plant with a nutrient solution,
A first compartment, which has a substantially closed structure and in which a cultivation device for hydroponically cultivating a plant is arranged, and a nutrient solution is circulated through the cultivation device, and the nutrient solution is cooled by evaporation to obtain a nutrient solution. And a second section in which a processing device that sends the refrigerant to the first section is arranged.

The present invention is also a complete control type plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating a plant with a nutrient solution, which has a substantially closed structure and in which a cultivating apparatus for hydroponically cultivating the plant is arranged. It is characterized by comprising one compartment and a third compartment arranged above the first compartment and having a structure capable of being ventilated between the first compartment and the first compartment.

The present invention is also a complete control type plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating a plant with a nutrient solution, wherein a cultivation device for hydroponically cultivating a plant is disposed inside, which has a substantially closed structure. No. 1 section, a second section in which a nutrient solution is circulated in the cultivating apparatus, a treatment apparatus that cools the nutrient solution by evaporation and sends the nutrient solution to the first section as a refrigerant is provided. Of the first partition, and the partition wall between the second partition and the second partition is formed of a material having good thermal conductivity. And a third section.

[0012]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, the purpose of reducing the cooling cost can be achieved by using the nutrient solution as the refrigerant. That is, since the plant culture solution circulates in the hydroponic cultivation apparatus, a part of this is separately provided in the evaporation chamber (second
Section). The circulation pump and water are already existing, so there is no need to prepare a new one. In other words, it has a great advantage in combination with hydroponics.

The evaporation chamber is installed separately from the cultivation chamber (first section), in which the circulating nutrient solution is spread in a fine mist or in a wide area. A dehumidifier or blower is provided in the evaporation chamber to remove the heat of evaporation.

The cooled water (cooled nutrient solution) is condensed and returned to the cultivation room. This cooling liquid is used in the cultivation room to lower its temperature, that is, as a refrigerant. Generally, in a hydroponic device, the power of the circulation pump is also applied to water, so that the water temperature tends to be higher than the air temperature. Depending on the plant, the lower one is often preferable, but it has not been possible so far. According to the present invention, by adjusting the degree of evaporation, it becomes possible to freely set the height relationship between the air temperature and the water temperature.

Since the dehumidifier in the evaporation chamber has the purpose of increasing the efficiency of evaporative cooling, it is not a simple dehumidifier in that respect. For this purpose, the dehumidifier has a dehumidifying surface directly inside the evaporative cooling device even if the dehumidifier is not in the cultivation room but in the open evaporation chamber. .

In this way, the cold water produced in the evaporation chamber is returned to the cultivation room, which is effective for cooling the cultivation room. Cooling can be performed without excessively raising the temperature inside the cultivation room.

As described above, the conventional evaporative cooling system sucks hot outside air and uses it for evaporation to cool it, which is wasteful. Moreover, it was installed directly in the cultivation room to cool the air to cool the cultivation room.

On the other hand, in the present invention, water is used as a cooling medium instead of air, and the evaporative cooling device is placed in another second compartment. Even in the same evaporation method, such a method is used. Was not proposed yet. The features of this method are as follows.

Particularly, in the case of the complete control type, it is necessary to take a semi-closed structure in relation to the fertilization of carbon dioxide with respect to the plant, and it is not possible to directly take in or circulate the outside air as in the conventional method. Only water cooling system can be used.

From the viewpoint of thermal efficiency, it is difficult to determine the comparison between air cooling and water cooling because it varies depending on the situation, but in the present case, there is a clear difference. That is, in a small ventilation type evaporation chamber as compared with a large cultivation facility, the internal temperature is easily lowered, so that water is efficiently evaporated and condensed, so that the cooling efficiency is high. This is because the evaporation rate of water is determined by the distance from the condensing part and the temperature difference, so that the evaporation chamber in the second compartment, which is a separate compartment, can perform optimum thermal design regardless of the cultivation room.

On the other hand, when directly cooling a large cultivation room, regardless of whether it is evaporative cooling or normal cooling, neither heat transfer of air nor diffusion / distribution of water vapor is necessarily good, and the internal humidity is not sufficient. Uniform or easy to generate internal overhumidity.

Although the dehumidifier requires electric power, its cooling efficiency is high in a small evaporation chamber. In fact, when directly evaporating and cooling the cultivation room, it was often less than half (for example, 4 ° C) of the ideal value (for example, 7 ° C cooling). If it is provided, it can be operated in an almost ideal state. That is, the cooling cost can be reduced accordingly. For example, with the same cooling capacity, it can be estimated that the power consumption can be reduced to about 2/3.

[0023]

EXAMPLES The concrete structure of the hydroponic cultivation facility according to the present invention is as follows.
As shown in FIG. 1, it is a first compartment 100 having a semi-enclosed structure, in which a hydroponic cultivation facility 101 and an artificial lighting facility 102 are housed. Adjacent to this, there is a second compartment 200, in which ventilation equipment 2 that takes in outside air is provided.
There is 01 and it is not sealed. The nutrient solution pipe 105 from the first compartment 100 is connected to the second compartment 200, and the evaporative cooling is performed by the evaporative cooling device 204 using this solution. The cooled liquid flows back to the first compartment 100 through another pipe 106. Since the concentration of the nutrient solution becomes high due to evaporation, a device 107 for replenishing water is usually provided in the first compartment 100 in order to detect and correct it.

The first compartment 100 and the second compartment 200 are
Except for the pipes 105 and 106, they are independent of each other,
The cooling water alone is used to dissipate heat from the first compartment 100. Of course, the pipes 105 and 106 are cut off and suspended at times when cooling is not required except during summer.

Next, a second application example of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. In the above description, the first compartment 100 was cooled only by the liquid, but in this example, the atmosphere is also cooled at the same time so that the cooling is further effective.

In this embodiment, the portion of the first compartment 100 near the ceiling is named the third compartment 300.
It is not completely independent of the first section 100, but refers to the artificial lighting 102 in the first section 100 and other portions where the atmosphere heated by the ascending air current due to heat gathers. This is because of the need for carbon dioxide fertilization, the first section 10
This is because it is necessary to combine 0 and the third section 300 together to form a semi-sealed state, and the boundary between the first section 100 and the third section 300 may not be particularly necessary. In the case of a building with a two-story structure, a cultivation lighting facility is housed on the lower floor, heated atmosphere is collected on the upper floor, and an opening is provided on the ceiling of the lower floor in the middle and the floor of the upper floor. Well, in this case, the lower floor is the first section 10
0, the upper floor corresponds to the third section 300.

The third section 300 is the above-mentioned second section 20.
0 through a wall 305, which is made of a material having good heat conductivity, such as an aluminum plate.
In this case, the heat is transferred from the temperature rising portion of the third section 300 to the atmosphere by the second evaporation and cooling (however, the humidity is high) by heat conduction. This differs from the liquid cooling of the first application example in that air cooling is also used, and the cooling effect is comprehensively increased.

It is effective to make the wall 305 thin and widen the wall area in order to enhance the heat conduction. Also, the second
It is effective that the evaporative cooling air is brought into direct contact with the wall 305 by the evaporative cooling air inside the compartment 200 of FIG. Also, the wall 30
Various conceivable methods can be applied to the structure of No. 5 in which the air is circulated in a complicated shape or a pipe descending shape instead of a simple plane to perform heat exchange.

A concrete configuration example of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. 2. In the first section 100, a hydroponic cultivation facility 101 main body and an artificial lighting facility 102 are housed. First compartment 10
The layers near the 0 ceiling are easily partitioned so that the warmed atmosphere gathers here. The opening here can be opened and closed depending on the season. This upper part is the third section 300. The relationship between the first and third sections 100 and 300 is related to the prior application of the present inventor (Japanese Patent Application No. 6-316657).
Is the same as

The first and third 100, 300 compartments are
Adjacent to the second compartment 200, the first compartment 100 and the second compartment 200 are provided by the nutrient solution pipes 105 and 106, and the third compartment 300 and the second compartment 200 are provided by the heat transfer wall 305. Only connected.

The second compartment 200 has an evaporative cooling device 204 for nutrient solution and an outside air intake ventilation device 201 therefor.
The cooled nutrient solution is returned to the first compartment 100, and the atmosphere is cooled by the cooled atmosphere through the wall 305 of the third compartment 300. For this reason, it is preferable to provide a blower for conveying cold air to the upper wall 305 in the second compartment 200.

In the second application example, the cooling capacity is increased by about 20% as compared with the first application example.
Therefore, the energy cost is low. Of course, this is only an example, as there are large differences depending on the conditions of the equipment.

[0033]

INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY As described above, according to the present invention, practical cooling can be performed with a relatively simple structure, and its effectiveness is remarkable especially in a completely controlled plant factory. It is extremely useful in industry because it can reduce costs and increase economic efficiency.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram of a first embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram of a second embodiment of the present invention.

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A completely controlled plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating a plant with a nutrient solution, which comprises a first section having a substantially closed structure and having a cultivating device for hydroponically cultivating the plant therein. A second compartment in which a treatment device is disposed, in which the nutrient solution is circulated through the cultivation apparatus, the nutrient solution is cooled by evaporation, and the nutrient solution is sent to the first compartment as a refrigerant. A characteristic plant cultivation facility. 2. A completely controlled plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating a plant with a nutrient solution, which comprises a first section having a substantially closed structure and having a cultivating device for hydroponically cultivating the plant therein. A plant cultivation facility, comprising: a third compartment that is arranged above the first compartment and has a structure that allows ventilation with the first compartment. 3. A completely controlled plant cultivation facility for hydroponically cultivating a plant with a nutrient solution, comprising a first section having a substantially closed structure and having a cultivating device for hydroponically cultivating the plant therein. A second compartment in which a treatment device is disposed, in which the nutrient solution is circulated in the cultivation apparatus, the nutrient solution is cooled by evaporation, and the nutrient solution is sent to the first section as a refrigerant; Of the first partition, and the partition wall between the second partition and the second partition is made of a material having good thermal conductivity. A plant cultivation facility, characterized by comprising a third compartment that is present.