Greenhouse farming and energy intensive water recovery systems need new innovative applications to reduce their energy consumption.
The EU-funded TheGreefa project (GA101000801) introduces and tests new technologies to reduce the overall energy consumption in greenhouses and to maximise at the same time the quote of renewable energy used for cooling, heating and humidity control and to water recovery. The technology recovers the latent heat and water from air humidity using saline solutions. The driving force required for the processes is low-temperature heat, e.g. solar heat or residual heat. The energy can be stored in form of concentrated salt solution without energy loss allowing seasonal storages and energy shift from summer to winter.
The technologies are tested and demonstrated in real greenhouses in two different climate regions in Switzerland and in Tunisia and simulated using modelled case studies in Italy and Spain.
12 partners from 7 different countries take part to the project, including Switzerland (ZHAW) and Germany (TU-Berlin, Watergy GmbH). Part of the activities are funded by the Swiss Federal Office for Energy (Sorptive Gewächshausklimatisierung mit Thermochemischem Speicher SI/502038-01 and SONITRO SI/502013-01) and are performed in collaboration with CONSIRS (Project 1453 of the EU H2020 PRIMA MED network).