MATERIALS NEEDED FOR THE DELIVERABLE
1. Clear, hard plastic
3. Carbon dioxide meter
4. Bicarbonate indicator solution (potassium chloride, thymol blue, cresol red, ethanol, sodium bicarbonate)
5. Carbon dioxide tank (source of carbon dioxide during the experiment)
MATERIALS NEEDED FOR TESTING THE EFFICIENCY OF THE CARBON DIOXIDE-TO-OXYGEN CONVERSION
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| Carbon Dioxide Tank Loaned by Dr. Waring in the Dept. of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering |
A pure carbon dioxide tank will needed to release carbon dioxide into the mechanism to see the conversion rate and the efficiency of the carbon dioxide-to-oxygen conversion. The initial idea was to expose the carbon dioxide meters directly to the car exhaust fumes but the meters are not strong enough to handle such a strong concentration of carbon dioxide, and they will not be able to detect small fluctuations in carbon dioxide levels. For these reasons, pure carbon dioxide seemed to be a good option.
Carbon Dioxide Meters Loaned by Dr. Waring in the Dept. of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering
These are Telaire carbon dioxide meters that could register up to 4000 ppm of carbon dioxide (the readings are very accurate up until 2000 ppm). The carbon dioxide read the amount of carbon dioxide and register the values into a data logger whose data can be accessed and used in Microsoft Excel. The meters also read the temperature so a correlation could possibly be made between the temperature and the amount of carbon dioxide converted to oxygen by the plants.
These links below were used to learn how to use the product and how to calibrate the carbon dioxide meters to each other to get accurate readings:
Telaire Carbon Dioxide Monitor Manual for Start-Up and Usage:
Telaire Carbon Dioxide Monitor Manual for Calibration:
English Ivy Hanging Plant
The English Ivy is the plant that will be tested on for converting the carbon dioxide to oxygen. The carbon dioxide meters will be placed into the compartment with the plants and as the carbon dioxide is released into the device, the carbon dioxide meters will take readings of how much these plants are converting and at what rate the plants are converting carbon dioxide to oxygen.
