Skogluft by Jorn Viumdal

Author:Jorn Viumdal
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2019-03-06T16:00:00+00:00

CORRECTING A FEW MISCONCEPTIONS

Growing, vital plants produce oxygen as a by-product of photosynthesis. A little more than 20 percent of the air we breathe consists of oxygen. If you’ve ever dreamed of just closing the doors and windows on the outside world and living a self-sufficient life on home-produced oxygen from your own plants, you’re not alone. During the 1960s and ’70s, while preparing for humans living in space for long periods, both Russian and American researchers carried out experiments aimed at humans surviving in greenhouses on space stations, the moon, or other planets. NASA’s Biosphere 2 in Arizona involved a closed system in which plants, animals, and humans were to live without an external supply of oxygen. Eight people moved into an airtight greenhouse 3.14 acres in size and lived there from 1991 to 1993. (The next year, 1994, also saw a brief mission there.) Maintaining the necessary level of oxygen proved too difficult, and finally liquid oxygen had to be trucked in.

In actuality, the area required to produce enough oxygen to sustain one person is about the size of four or five soccer fields covered in dense vegetation. In other words, unless you live in a mansion that size or own a large plot of land on which you can erect a glass dome, becoming oxygen self-sufficient is going to be a difficult business.

Some people fret about going to bed, turning out the lights, and being surrounded by plants emitting carbon dioxide, as plants in darkness do not undergo photosynthesis, which produces oxygen. Some plant books actually recommend that you don’t keep plants in the bedroom because they might use up the oxygen in the air and replace it with carbon dioxide and so affect the quality of your sleep. Night and day, plants actually do emit carbon dioxide during a process called respiration, but the amounts are negligible, especially during photosynthesis. Carbon dioxide is an odorless, colorless gas that is a natural component of the air we breathe. It also has an image problem, since it’s one of the gases responsible for the greenhouse effect. But CO2 is a necessary part of the cycle of nature, a precondition for the maintenance of life on earth—though in recent times the amount of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere has increased as a result of human activity, with one of the effects being possible climate change. In any case, this has no significance for you as a user of Forest Air. Your Forest Air wall cannot raise the level of carbon dioxide in the air either in your home or in the atmosphere in any measurable way.

So set up your plant wall wherever you like, even if, as for so many people in the modern world, your living room is also your bedroom. And sleep tight.

Compared to the five soccer fields that are needed to provide you with oxygen, it becomes even more remarkable that humble houseplants and a simple lighting arrangement would have such a powerful effect. The

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.