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"... it has been found that flowers in cold storage
suffer from dehydration caused by the low relative humidity that exists in
the cooling areas, created by the action of the cooling unit that absorbs the
water vapor from the air space in the cold store.
In our estimation, this problem can be dealt with in two ways. Firstly, by
attempting through various technologies, such as developing covers for the
flowers, which will create a micro-climate with a higher relative humidity
around the flowers which will reduce the evaporation of water from the
flowers into the surroundings. Secondly, it is possible to attempt to
increase the relative humidity in the cold store, thereby reducing the
desiccation of the flowers while at the same time, as we are dealing here with
larger air volumes, reduces the danger of such, or other, toxification.
Whereas the second option at the moment appears to be simpler, we have found
that there is room to attempt to integrate the "Shira" fog
generator that disperses water into very small droplets (5 microns) which
enables a technology for increasing relative humidity while slightly
increasing the relative amount of free water that represents, as stated, a
nuisance to operating systems.
In our opinion, systems such as Shira's system, offers a positive
contribution while increasing the relative humidity in every one of the
following applications:
1. During work in flower storage warehouses, whether
grower owned or regional.
2. During the routine cooling of flowers by growers.
3. During prolonged storage in cold stores for
entrepreneurial considerations.
The working procedures that were adopted in this instance also. were based on
experiments at our laboratory and the conclusions reached enables a transfer
to a larger scale. Most certainly today, fog generators are very efficient at
increasing the relative humidity during the prolonged storage of flowers. It
is important to mention that as this system worked successfully in the
laboratory. a larger system was installed at the Azata
flower cold-store. This system increased the humidity in the cooling chamber
over about three weeks while stabilizing relative humidity in the range of
89-93% humidity. In practice, approximately half a million roses of different
varieties (Jaguar, Mercedes, Florop and others)
were stored. This storage was carried out purely for commercial
considerations and was used instead of expensive controlled storage in
refrigerated containers that have been used for this purpose until now. At
the end of the storage period. the flowers were removed and shipped to their
various destinations in Europe where the boxes were opened and the flowers
underwent additional quality checks. it was found that out of 1600 cardboard
boxes containing the flowers, approximately 10 containers were damaged, most
of which contained problematic varieties that for various reasons are hard to
keep in storage such as the Meifota variety whose
color is a deep pink that is inclined to turn bluish..."
Tandler Application Developments, Karme Yosef, Israel
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