(63b) Carbon Dioxide Recapture Utilizing an Integrated Vertical Aquaponics System

Consistent population growth coupled with ongoing urbanization poses a variety of needs for increasingly congested metropolitan areas across America. Food supply, above all, is a major concern for these communities. However meeting such large-scale demands of nourishment that is healthy, economical, and sustainable has proven to be exceedingly challenging in regions so limited with regard to physical space available for cultivation. A contained, vertical aquaponic farming system is proposed as a self-sustaining source of urban agriculture.

Use of controlled LED lighting in an entirely contained and insulted system boasts the opportunity to grow a variety of crops at their ideal temperatures in any geographic climate, regardless of system location. Aquaculture wastewater effluent offers generous nutrients to plants grown on media beds and is consequently filtered for sufficient re-use in the fish growth tanks. Previously, aquaponic systems rely on the burning of petroleum-based fuels to supply plant beds with carbon dioxide necessary for plant growth. In a novel venture, we aim to utilize the carbon dioxide waste from batch fermentation for plant cultivation. During fermentation, for each molecule of ethanol produced, one molecule of carbon dioxide is also formed. As such, breweries generate large amounts of carbon dioxide during production, resulting in waste that is both harmful to the environment and costly.