Development of a naturally-ventilated solar energy-assisted maize seed store.

Abstract

The seed industry continues to face losses during seed storage, especially in Africa. Moreover, there is high loss of seed viability during storage, mainly due to the poor ventilation in seed storage structures, which results in the development of storage fungi. In this study, the main objectives were to construct, to evaluate the solar energy assisted maize seed store. A 22-m3 room was converted to a seed storage room by retrofitting a chimney on its wall and a solar collector on its roof. Different chimney sizes were investigated in order to identify which size would be best for the construction of a naturally-ventilated seed storage room. The chimney sizes that were used included those with a diameter and a height of 200 mm x 3600 mm, 200 mm x 4800 mm, 300 mm x 3600 m and 300 mm x 4800 mm. The parameters, air velocity in the chimney duct, as well as the air temperature and relative humidity at the inlet, centre and outlet of the storage room, were recorded during the seed storage period. A naturally- ventilated seed storage room was developed based on the results obtained. A naturally-ventilated seed storage room was then evaluated in terms of its effectiveness to preserve the quality of the stored maize seeds. To compare the performance of the modified storage room, a room with similar storage capacity, but without the retrofitted components, was used as a control. Maize seeds were stored in each storage room for the duration of three months. Samples were taken every two weeks for germination, moisture content and seed vigour analyses. Both the diameter and height of the chimney were found to have a significant (P≤0.05) influence on the air ventilation rate inside the storage room. A seed storage was therefore developed using a 300 mm x 4.8 m chimney size, which performed better than the other chimney sizes that were explored in this study. The relative humidity in the control storage room was significantly (P≤0.05) higher (60.6 ± 5.87%) than the relative humidity in the modified storage room (40.1 ± 3.21%). The moisture content obtained in the control room was significantly (P≤0.05) higher (13.3%) than the moisture content obtained in the modified storage room (12.6%). The initial germination was 99%. The seed germination percentage obtained after three months of storage in the modified storage room was significantly higher (P≤0.05) (98.5 ± 0.85%) than the germinations percentage obtained in the control storage (96.8 ± 1.49%). The seed vigour obtained in the modified storage was significantly higher (P≤0.05) than the seed vigour obtained in the control room. Thus, a naturally-ventilated seed storage room was tested and was found to preserve the quality of the seeds over the duration of storage.