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Next Green Thing: Vertical Farming
By Virginia Prescott on Tuesday, September 2, 2008.
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The concept of “vertical farming” seems more fitted for a sci-fi novel, or maybe a project in Dubai.
The tall, skyscraper-like structures set in urban areas would grow enough produce to replace traditional farms. Instead of growing tomatoes in the Midwest and shipping them to New York City, burning valuable fossil fuels and contributing to global warming along the way, farmers could raise vegetables in these towers only a few miles from the corner stores in the city.
One proposed device, the Omega Garden Carousel, takes up 150 square feet of floor space, but its output could equal 1,500 square feet of farmland.
Dickson Despommier came up with the concept almost a decade ago, and he’s been championing it ever since. He list many advantages to vertical farming, including year-round crop production, plants protected from severe weather, no need for pesticides or fertilizers, and less stress on farmlands, among others. He estimates it would cost $20 million to $30 million to make a prototype of a vertical farm, but hundreds of millions to build one of the 30-story towers that he suggests could feed 50,000 people.
Dr. Despommier is a professor of public health at Columbia University, and joins Word of Mouth for the next installment of our "next green thing" series.
(Image and design by Chris Jacobs)
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Word of Mouth is all about what's new. Online and on-air, the show looks at our fascinating and ever-changing world, and puts the latest ideas under a microscope. Word of Mouth investigates everything from science and technology, to health and the environment, to new trends in popular culture. The show airs Monday through Thursday at noon and is hosted by Virginia Prescott.
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A complimentary approach with vertical farming is sub-acre SPIN-Farming which is now being practiced throughout the U.S. and Canada. SPIN makes it possible to earn $50,000+ from a half-acre by growing vegetables on land bases under an acre in size. SPIN farmers utilize relay cropping to increase yield and achieve good economic returns by growing only the most profitable food crops tailored to local markets. SPIN's growing techniques are not, in themselves, breakthrough. What is novel is the way a SPIN farm business is run. SPIN provides everything you'd expect from a good franchise: a business plan, marketing advice, and a detailed day-to-day workflow. In standardizing the system and creating a reproducible process it really isn't any different from McDonalds. So by offering a non-technical, easy-to-understand and inexpensive-to-implement farming system, it allows many more people to farm, wherever they live, as long as there are nearby markets to support them, and it removes the two big barriers to entry – sizeable acreage and significant start-up capital. By utilizing backyards and front lawns and neighborhood lots, SPIN farmers are recasting farming as a small business in cities and towns and "right sizing" agriculture for an urbanized century.
While vertical farming will still take some time and considerable investment to get off the ground, sub-are farming is already showing how agriculture can be integrated into the built environment in an economically viable manner. You can see some SPIN farmers in action at www.spinfarming.com
I spend a lot of time designing that Vertical Farm...credit is always appreciated. :)