Greenhouse Energy Recycling
Greenhouse Energy Recycling – In Hortidaily I was reading a story about a farm in Holland that recycled their wasted heat energy off their LED lighting.
The cleverness of this team and the farm is using greenhouse energy recycling to take wasted heat from one area of the greenhouse for uses in other parts of the greenhouse.
By using a special low electricity lighting to avoid electric shocks, they use water to cool the LED lighting. The water then absorbs the waste heat and then goes into a storage tank.
The water in the storage tank is then passed through a heat exchanger and then passed around the loop again.
The heat exchanger passes the heat from the water to a secondary water system for heating crop roots, or room heating, or even aquaponic aquatic water heating.
We particularly love this system, as here at Toyesi we invest time and effort into finding ways to use waste energy, especially heat energy to be used in other processes.
Toyesi works with some great suppliers of heat exchangers. SWEP plate heat exchangers are one such product that we can assist farmers in Australia set up a similar solution.
This project design by Florian Ablinger utilises heat exchangers. Heat exhangers are an excellent way to transfer heat from one water source to another body of water.
However, this transfer is never perfect. Usually the best you can get is about 50% of the temperature difference transferred.
So if the water off the LED lighting say is 42 degrees C (107F), only a portion of this heat will be lost to the cooling water, so the circulating water may heat up to around 30C. Which will also have the benefit of allowing the LED lights to run cooler, increasing their potential lifespan.
The 30C water will mix in the storage tank and the pass into the heat exchanger. If the circulating water in the 2nd loop is say 20C, you will have a temp difference of 10C thus you would potentially transfer 5C across to the 2nd loop for passing around 25C.
This is great for a Hydroponic set up or light temp control in hydronic heating of a green house.
However swapping out the heat exchanger for a Toyesi Water to Water Heat Pump, you now have the ability to boost the secondary water to 45 Degrees or more depending on your requirement.
A much more suitable solution for hydronic space heating of a greenhouse.
Toyesi – Water to Water Heat Pumps.
Just one of Toyesi’s many energy capture, storage& recycle concepts.
IF you want to now how Toyesi and its Horticulture Affiliates can help you and your horticulture, Hydroponic or Aquaponic business increase energy efficiency, reduce running costs or minimise your waste energy then give us a call.
Contact us on 02 9679 9400 or by email info@toyesi.com.au and we can discuss how we can best assist you in your projects.
