Plant growth/production in a chamber with bioclimatic conditioning

GARCIA V.; IRIARTE A.; LESINO G.; FLORES LARSEN S.; MATÍAS C,

Lisboa, Portugal

Congreso; Eurosun 2008; 2008

SPES - Sociedade Portuguesa de Energia Solar

One of the difficulties in walnut and carob trees propagation is the genetic variability and insufficient offer of grafted plants. In walnut trees, it is necessary to graft high quality buds in a walnut stem; whereas in carob trees, one of the techniques used is the stem cutting propagation. Both techniques require different temperature, light and humidity conditions. With the purpose of producing both species simultaneously, an existing chamber was set up to control the hygrothermal conditions inside it. In order to obtain the best rooting conditions, the proposal is to heat beds using a mixed sun-gas system by means of solar collectors and a gas water tank to heat the water circulating in pipes. In this work, the aim is to analyze the hygrothermal behavior of the chamber, the whole system operation, and the agronomic results obtained with the simultaneous walnut grafting and the carob rooting. Results show the advisibility of using solar collectors to heat the beds in production systems with the purpose of saving energy, stressing the high percentage of plants obtained.