Preliminary experiment on water vapor recovery and recycling for plant cultivation under microgravity (1)

• Published in: Eco-Engineering Vol. 12; no. 1; pp. 21 - 25
• Main Authors: Tani, Akira, Okuma, Takeshi, Tanaka, Sigeki, Saito, Takahiro, Kitaya, Yoshiaki, Goto, Eiji, Takahashi, Hideyuki
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Japanese
• Published: The Society of Eco-Engineering 1999
• Subjects: Fiber; Micro-gravity; Water recovery
• ISSN: 0915-4353; 1884-4669
• DOI: 10.11450/seitaikogaku1989.12.21

Development of water recovery and recycling system in a plant growth chamber is most important challenge for plant cultivation under micro-gravity. In this paper, a water recycling system consisting of Peltier cooler unit and capillary fibrous mat for water transport is proposed as a suitable technology for small-scale closed plant growth chamber under micro-gravity. In the preliminary experiment, maximum water condensation rate by the fin of Peltier cooler unit was 100g/day. This value is not high enough to support water circulation in plant growth chamber when mature plants are densely grown. Water could be successfully transferred from the fin to the plant growth medium through the fibrous mat in the short-term experiment (144h). A long-term experiment is required to evaluate the system performance and stability. Key factors controlling water movement of the system, including hydraulic conductivity of the fibrous mat and medium and water condensation capacity of cooling fin, are discussed.