Design of automatic temperature-humidity control system in mushroom chamber for energy optimization in mushrooms production

This paper discusses about the design of a mushroom fruiting chamber (so-called kumbung) with an automated temperature and humidity control system for optimizing energy requirements in mushrooms production. The condition of the temperature and humidity in the kumbung has a very important role in the mushroom media and the growth of mushroom. Therefore, these conditions should be maintained precisely at all times. The initial conditioning process was pasteurization of the mushroom media at a temperature of 70 - 75 oC and humidity 80 - 90 %, within 3-4 hours. The next process was conditioning the room at a temperature of 30-34 oC and 80-90% humidity as a process of growth and development of edible mushrooms. All of these conditions were controlled by a developed automatic control system which consists of some thermostat and humidistat as the main component. The temperature and humidity in the mushroom fruiting chamber were controlled to increase the effectiveness and quality of the mushrooms in order to resulting in a successful mushroom harvest. The result of the study showed that temperature and humidity control automation system have a mushroom harvesting success rate (75 – 100) % based on the population growth in the fruiting chamber where it is fully covered by mushrooms. The highest sun heat absorption temperature, absorption power and efficiency were resulted in the flow of water at 0.4 l/min.