The objective of the study was to predict crop coefficient (K) values for cucumber inside the greenhouse during the growing season 2014, using watermarks gypsum blocks and atmometer c apparatus during the growing stages and to compare the predicted values of the crop coefficient with different methods and approaches. The study was conducted in the greenhouses field within Al-Mahawil Township, 70 km south of Baghdad, Iraq. The watermarks soil water sensors and atmometer apparatus were used to measure crop evapotranspiration and reference evapotranspiration on daily basis, respectively. The comparison and the statistical analysis between the calculated K in this study and values obtained from greenhouse gave a good agreement. The root mean square difference (RMSD) and relative error (RE) gave an average value of: 0.065 mm/day and 9%, respectively. While, the comparison between the predicted K c values and approaches developed by FAO (modified) and Ministry of Water Resources of Iraq gave less agreement. The values of RMSD and RE gave an average value of: 0.188 mm/day, 27%, and 0.17 mm/day and 26.8%, respectively. The method used by FAO and Ministry of Water Resources of Iraq was conducted on basis of using modified empirical equation suggested by FAO-56.
Modeling the microclimate of a greenhouse located in Baghdad under its weather conditions to calculate the heating and cooling loads by computer simulation. Solar collectors with a V-corrugated absorber plate and an auxiliary heat source were used as a heating system. A rotary silica gel desiccant dehumidifier, a sensible heat exchanger, and an evaporative cooler were added to the collectors to form an open-cycle solar assisted desiccant cooling system. A dynamic model was adopted to predict the inside air and the soil surface temperatures of the greenhouse. These temperatures are used to predict the greenhouse heating and cooling loads through an energy balance method which takes into account the soil heat gain. This is not included in
... Show MoreA simple technique is proposed in this paper for estimating the coefficient of permeability of an unsaturated soil based on physical properties of soils that include grain size analysis, degree of saturation or water content, and porosity of the soil. The proposed method requires the soil-water characteristic curve for the prediction of the coefficient of permeability as most of the conventional methods. A procedure is proposed to define the hydraulic conductivity function from the soil water characteristic curve which is measured by the filter paper method. Fitting methods are applied through the program (SoilVision), after indentifying the basic properties of the soil such as Attereberg limits, specific gravity, void ratio, porosity, d
... Show MoreIn the present work, steady two – dimensional laminar natural convection heat transfer of Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids inside isosceles triangular enclosure has been analyzed numerically for a wide range of the modified Rayleigh numbers of (103 ≤ Ra ≤ 105), with non-dimensional parameter (NE) of Prandtl – Eyring model ranging from (0 to 10), and modified Prandtl number take in the range (Pr* =1,10, and 100). Two types of boundary conditions have been considered. The first, when the inclined walls are heated with different uniform temperatures and the lower wall is insulated. The second, when the bottom wall is heated by applying a uniform heat flux while the inclined walls at
... Show MoreMany researchers used different methods in their investigations to enhance the heat transfer coefficient, one of these methods is using porous medium. Heat transfer process inside closed and open cavities filled with a fluid-saturated porous media has a considerable importance in different engineering applications, such as compact heat exchangers, nuclear reactors and solar collectors. So, the present paper comprises a review on natural, forced, and combined convection heat transfer inside a porous cavity with and without driven lid. Most of the researchers on this specific subject studied the effect of many parameters on the heat transfer and fluid field inside a porous cavity, like the angle of inclination, the presenc
... Show MoreThe experiment was conducted to study the effect of leaves extract of Salvia sclarea , Rosmarinus officinalis and Thymus vulgaris with 10% and 30% concentration on germination of seeds and growth of seedlings . The effect of these extracts on infection percentage of seeds decay and surface growth of Rhizoctonia solani . The results showed that the three extracts effected significantly to reduced percentage of seeds germination, acceleration of germination , promoter indicator , infection percentage of seeds decay and surface growth of R. solani especially in 30% concentration .