• Journal of Bio-Environment Control
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.29-39
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• 2009

The influence of windbreak to minimize the ventilation velocity near the plant canopy of a greenhouse strawberry was thoroughly investigated using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) technology. Windbreaks were constructed surrounding the plant canopy to control ventilation and maintain the concentration of the supplied $CO_2$ from the soil surface close to the strawberry plants. The influence of no windbreak, 0.15 m and 0.30 m height windbreaks with varied air velocity of 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5 m/s were simulated in the study. The concentrations of supplied $CO_2$ within the plant canopy of were measured. To simplify the model, plants were not included in the final model. Considering 1.0m/s wind velocity which is the normal wind velocity of greenhouses, the concentrations of $CO_2$ were approximately 420, 580 and 653 ppm ($1{\times}10^{-9}kg/m^3$) for no windbreak, 0.15 and 0.30 m windbreak height, respectively. Considering that the maximum concentration of $CO_2$ for the strawberry plants was around 600-800 ppm, the 0.30 m windbreak height is highly recommended. This study revealed that the windbreak was very effective in preserving $CO_2$ gas within the plant canopy. More so, the study also proved that the CFD technique can be used to determine the concentration of $CO_2$ within the plant canopy for the plants consumption at any designed condition. For an in-depth application of this study, the plants as well as the different conditions for $CO_2$ utilization, etc. should be considered.