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With lots of rain there is going to be a lot of humidity. With energy scarcity, drying foods becomes a challenge. We know we will need many lights to grow our food. Some types of lights generate a lot of waste heat. Heat rises. If a 500-1000 Watt halogen light is used, a hole can be drilled in the topside so that the air circulates up throughout a conventional wood or plastic food dryer. This would be placed or build directly above and around each light. The metal parts of the top of the light will radiate lots of heat this should not be lost. One such simple dryer could be simply a big funnel over the top of each lamp feeding into a zigzag stair step box that is say 2-3 ft high and 1 ft square. Front side opens to put the items in. See the following figure for ideas.

 Hot air
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||--- --|| air hole Lamp Light 

Enzymes begin to die off at about 118-180 degrees Fahrenheit as best I can recall. It would be a good idea when building this to stick a thermometer in this unit near the inlet and where the air comes out to adjust the air flow volume by the size of hole in the bottom, until the temperature comes out to be below say about 118 degrees or whatever our experts on this subject say. It may be that some foods are OK to dry at hotter temperatures.

Offered by Mike.

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