
How to convince your friends vertical farming is the next big thing - giltleaf
https://urbanverticalproject.wordpress.com/2015/03/10/why-vertical-farms/
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maliker
Vertical farming is an energy nightmare. It requires at least 1000x more
energy than conventional agriculture because you have to provide supplemental
light for the plants to grow indoors.

Others have addressed this:

"... the light required to grow the 500 grammes of wheat that a loaf of bread
contains would cost, at current prices, £9.82. (The current farm gate price
for half a kilo of wheat is 6p.) That’s just lighting: no inputs, interest,
rents, rates, or labour. Somehow this minor consideration – that plants need
light to grow and that they aren’t going to get it except on the top storey –
has been overlooked by the scheme’s supporters. I won’t bother to explain the
environmental impacts."

\-- [http://www.monbiot.com/2010/08/16/towering-
lunacy/](http://www.monbiot.com/2010/08/16/towering-lunacy/)

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bloat
Is it possible to pipe free sunlight into a vertical farm using fiber?

~~~
maliker
You would need a fiber collection area the same size as the total floor space
of your vertical farm. So it would have to be absolutely massive.

~~~
e12e
So, this sounds like it could be great for very arid areas, where it might be
easy(?) to build a massive solar farm in the desert, and run a cable to the
city -- but not sustainable to water the same area where one can put solar?
Switch solar for wind turbines in areas with little sun light and strong
winds.

I wonder if it would be any easier to recycle water in a city/building than if
used for "normal" farming?

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hanniabu
What's making this transition difficult is the economic viability. It only
makes sense in densely populated areas but those areas also have ridiculous
property values and higher utility costs. That makes it increasingly difficult
for these farms because the margins in farming aren't that great. I work for a
vertical farming company (Verticulture Farms) and we've been struggling to
find a place where we can expandthat makes financial sense.

~~~
adventured
That's certainly true today. I'm sure Verticulture Farms is in it for the long
haul though.

The dramatic improvements in output, quality, and water use will make vertical
farming superior in nearly all cases within a few decades. It'll make sense
everywhere traditional farming occurs, not just in densely populated areas.
That's not the case today, but it will be the case tomorrow, given this is the
first inning of a multi-trillion dollar global revolution in food production.
People in the future will think it's crazy that we used to grow so much of our
food outside.

~~~
hanniabu
That's definitely true. As the cost of LED fixtures go down and the cost of
food goes up, it'll definitely becone profitable quickly and there will be a
surge in appearances of vertical farms.

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rdlecler1
There was a lot of discussions about the benefits, and some discussion that
was missed. However, vertical farming is still not cost effective compared to
more traditional greenhouses. And that's for the highest value crops like
lettuce and tomatoes. Commodity crops and animal agriculture are the biggest
resource users in this system and vertical farming is no where close to
finding a substitute for those. The cost of production will need to come down
below the alternatives and that will be challenging, although not impossible
in principle.

~~~
rm999
Farming comes with huge amounts of negative environmental externalities (lost
ecosystems, runoff, pesticides). I'm curious how the cost effectiveness would
change if farms were properly taxed for their environmental impact.

~~~
toomuchtodo
> I'm curious how the cost effectiveness would change if farms were properly
> taxed for their environmental impact.

Conversely, I wonder if the viability changes if urban areas would subsidize
the underlying (most likely expensive) land costs for vertical farming, due to
food being required to survive.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Conversely, I wonder if the viability changes if urban areas would subsidize
> the underlying (most likely expensive) land costs for vertical farming, due
> to food being required to survive.

Well, the viability of living in urban areas would certainly change if another
land use competing with housing and existing commercial uses was subsidized by
taxing existing residents.

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exelius
The problem here is that in many cases, you're replacing things that have
historically been free (light, water, air) with things that are not free (LED
lights, irrigation systems, exhaust/air circulators). The increase in
complexity also incurs a lot of additional overhead costs. Modern "horizontal"
farming is already largely automated; so vertical farming doesn't deliver any
savings on that front.

Don't get me wrong -- I am a fan of vertical farming and I think that it's an
important technology for us to develop because we're going to eventually trash
the planet and we need some way to grow food -- but there are way too many
economic problems with it for it to be much more than a novelty right now. IMO
the most promising near-term use case is marijuana - there are already
regulatory reasons to incur most of the costs of vertical farming, so it's
less of a disadvantage (not to mention that high-grade stuff has to be grown
indoors to prevent cross-pollenation).

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codingdave
Many people are concerned about the economics of this, but in my mind, trying
to scale food production is itself the problem. I know I sound over-
idealistic, and usually am not well received when I ask this, but I'll ask
anyway -- If every home had a room dedicated to vertical farming, instead a
room for watching TV, what would that do for the problem?

~~~
fredkbloggs
The question is moot, because most humans have decided they're going to watch
TV and not garden. There are hundreds of millions (at least) of people living
in urban and suburban areas who could be gardening today, indoors or outdoors
or both, with far less investment and expense than this method entails. Very
few do. There's no reason to think that you're going to convince those who are
not to start by adding the further requirements that they (a) dedicate a room
to it, (b) buy a bunch of expensive shelving, (c) buy a bunch of expensive LED
lights, (d) triple their electricity bill (at least), and (e) double their
water bill (at least).

Maybe if food prices are 50x what they are today this starts to seem
interesting. Like Victory Gardens. Of course, if that happened, then
electricity and urban (potable!) water prices would immediately become
unaffordable as well and we would simply end up at a new equilibrium with
higher urban water and electricity prices, slightly lower food prices, and a
few extra indoor gardeners making up those margins.

And don't tell me that solar-generated electricity is the answer here. A PV
module is about 16% efficient; absorbing sunlight directly is 100% efficient
(in both cases, photosynthesis itself is then about 45% efficient). So you
would need 6x as much land dedicated to PV modules as you would need to
dedicate to outdoor, rooftop, or windowbox gardens to get the same output.
This is a problem of physics; even a 100% efficient PV module would be only
marginally useful, in that it would allow capturing energy on land that is not
itself suited for agriculture.

No free lunches, and that's before we're talking about wholesale changes in
human behavior.

~~~
codingdave
I agree, which is why I said I was overly idealistic. But we are at (or
approaching) a point where wholesale changes in human behavior are needed.
We've spent the last 100 years getting more and more obsessed with TV, movies,
and pop culture. It is time to swing our culture back the other way. And to
start those changes, you need to ask questions and build up new (or old)
ideas..

So I ask the question. Thinking about making large societal changes is a first
step towards actually making a change.

~~~
fredkbloggs
If the predicate is wholesale changes in human behavior, there are plenty of
less costly ways people could, and can, produce their own food. Imposing a
moral judgment on people obsessed with things you don't happen to like is
orthogonal to that. People will change their behaviors when the market
dictates that they change them, and when that happens they will change them in
the direction dictated by the market. Your personal preferences for how others
should spend their time will not factor.

~~~
codingdave
Clearly, you and I are not going to see eye to eye. "The market" is a societal
construct to begin with. Money is a societal construct. "Less costly" is a
concept based on top of those things. In my mind, humans starving to death is
a pretty high cost, no matter how much cash a solution would require.

~~~
fredkbloggs
> Clearly, you and I are not going to see eye to eye.

For sure. The market is not a social construct at all; beings that want to
reproduce (i.e., everyone) are going to adopt the lowest-cost means of doing
so. Growing plants indoors will always be a higher-cost solution. "Money" has
nothing to do with it. What you're really saying is that you want huge numbers
of less-fit humans to survive and reproduce. That's a profound statement that
deserves its own article and a tremendous depth of thought to evaluate. As you
probably imagine, I don't share your goal.

~~~
codingdave
"You want huge numbers of less-fit humans to survive and reproduce."

Yes, I really do. I believe wars have been fought over people putting fitness
requirements on survival and reproduction.

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jcfrei
I doubt we are going to see a revolution in farming. The reason traditional
farming is most likely still much cheaper than vertical farming is because of
all the government's implicit and explicit subsidies. For example: For most
farmers water is free so the 99% reduction in water usage won't reduce the
price for the consumer in the aisle. I think if we wan't a real shift in
agriculture (a shift towards more ecological vertical farming), we would
require an actual market price for water. And most people (farmers and non-
farmers) hate that idea.

~~~
bpodgursky
Only in California and the Colorado basin is water allocation and pricing a
real concern. The Midwest and south have water surplus and produce immensely
more food than CA. So I don't think this has a significant impact.

~~~
saalweachter
Ding, ding.

The math has to be done on a case by case basis. Why are all potatoes grown in
Idaho? Because soil and climate conditions there are _really good_ for
potatoes. You can grow potatoes in Idaho and ship them to Kansas for less --
less land use, less effort, less energy-cost, less environmental impact --
than you can grow them locally.

There are going to be some crops and some urban environments where vertical
farming is the best option. There are going to be some where it is not.

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fredkbloggs
So instead of less expensive land outside cities, we should grow food on
expensive land inside them. Ok.

And instead of less expensive nonpotable water supplies, we should use
expensive potable urban water supplies to irrigate it. Ok.

And instead of 100% efficient sunlight to drive photosynthesis, we should use
either 40% efficient fossil fuel derived electricity or 16% efficient PV
derived electricity to do it. Ok.

Also, instead of polluting creeks and rivers with agricultural runoff from
farms, we should pollute creeks and rivers with agricultural runoff mixed in
with urban sewage (sorry, there's no such thing as a "closed system"). Ok.

And finally, instead of paying $2 for an organically-grown, sustainably-farmed
head of lettuce at the farmers' market, we should pay $12 for a
hydroponically-grown head of lettuce.

This article contained zero analysis of economics. Comparisons made were with
"other indoor growing methods", not with outdoor sunlight-powered methods. No
analysis was undertaken to show that transportation costs make up the
difference. No explanation was provided for the added burden on urban
(potable!) water supplies. The electricity demands made by this method are
obviously unmanageable, yet no solution to this problem was offered (I guess
instead of polluting the planet with industrial ag, we pollute it by burning
10x as much coal?). The problem of waste is hand-waved away by calling the
operation a "closed system"; nothing lasts forever, and eventually the
materials used will have to be discarded, along with residues from the
inorganic inputs. "Weather-related crop failures" are dismissed; one wonders
where the author thinks urban water supplies and electricity for climate
control come from (hint: outdoors!).

If you want to improve the efficiency of farming, I'm all for it. You've got a
scalable, sustainable way to use less water? Great, go implement it on an
existing farm and put your competition out of business. But this is not that.
It's a gimmick that is at best marginally economical in places with the
world's highest real estate costs and customers willing to pay far above the
market rate for gimmicky products. That is not a situation that describes most
people on this planet. It's one thing to sell a few thousand heads of lettuce
to stockbrokers in Singapore; it's another thing entirely to convince a
billion Chinese people to leave their entire country fallow so that they can
pay a month's income for one of those heads of lettuce while breathing air so
heavily polluted by coal smoke that they drop dead at 25. Good luck with that.

~~~
hanniabu
The reason for growing in the city is to reduce transportation cost and
time.of it gets in the store the same day the plants were harvested then it
increases freshness/nutritional value and it increases the shelf life.

Growing indoors also allows for a greater control over the growing
environment. You can grow any particular grow all year round with much less
crop loss. This also eliminates the need for pesticides since you're closing
off the plants from insects. Therfore, the "agricultural runoff"is definitely
not the same as from an open farm. The only "runoff" is a handful of times a
year (maybe 4ish) where the reservoirs are emptied and cleaned.

Organically grown plants are GMO free and therefore need a lot more pesticides
to keep it looking good. So if you want to pay the cheaper price for a mouth
of chemical then that's on you. A lot of people aren't.

I agree that the electricity usage is an issue but this is something that is
being solved. Year by year we see lights getting more efficient and solar
panels getting more efficient as well.

When it comes to running out of farmable land and fresh water becoming more
scarce and a growing population though, the cost of electricity is a
worthwhile trade off in my opinion. You can't wait until the last minute to
make the transition away away from traditional agriculture and into more
future proof methodologies.

~~~
fredkbloggs
> The reason for growing in the city is to reduce transportation cost and
> time.of it gets in the store the same day the plants were harvested then it
> increases freshness/nutritional value and it increases the shelf life.

So let's see some analysis on the cost of growing in the city vs. cost of
transportation plus spoilage. Data, numbers, the good stuff!

> This also eliminates the need for pesticides since you're closing off the
> plants from insects.

You don't need to grow indoors to grow pesticide-free. Nor do you need to grow
indoors to protect plants from pests.

> Organically grown plants are GMO free and therefore need a lot more
> pesticides to keep it looking good. So if you want to pay the cheaper price
> for a mouth of chemical then that's on you.

Holy conflation, Batman! First of all, "organic" is a family of growing
methods; one could grow GM stock using organic methods if one wished, though
in most places it will be difficult to get certification. Second, by
definition "organic" methods prohibit or greatly restrict the use of
pesticides. So you're contradicting yourself here; someone growing non-GM food
organically is by definition not using them.

> I agree that the electricity usage is an issue but this is something that is
> being solved. Year by year we see lights getting more efficient and solar
> panels getting more efficient as well.

As I explained, this doesn't matter. A 100%-efficient PV module connected to a
100%-efficient LED bulb with a 100%-efficient transmission and distribution
system is _at best_ going to provide the same growing area as the area of
those PV modules. The physics of the situation simply do not allow anything
more than that, and in this universe, where we obey the laws of
thermodynamics, they don't even allow that. Surface farming will _always_ be
more efficient than covering the surface with PV modules and farming somewhere
else. If you cannot accept this, then your entire argument reduces to "indoor
farming is a perpetual motion machine" and you should expect it to be taken as
such.

> When it comes to running out of farmable land and fresh water becoming more
> scarce and a growing population though,

If you don't have fresh water, you cannot farm anywhere, period. A tap in an
urban building is not inhabited by magical water fairies; that water comes
from the same places that traditional farms get theirs. If you believe you
have a more water-efficient way to farm, why not combine that with the most
energy-efficient farming method as well and employ it on the surface? Don't
waste such an important advance by trying to sell it in a bundle with magic
and perpetual motion.

~~~
dragonwriter
> A tap in an urban building is not inhabited by magical water fairies; that
> water comes from the same places that traditional farms get theirs.

Well, the same general class of places, maybe not the same place. Which may
make the issue _worse_ \-- moving farming from existing locations to cities
may further concentrate water use in urban areas, leaving them needing to meet
the existing urban needs plus food production needs -- which may have a very
high cost in terms of new water delivery infrastructure.

~~~
fredkbloggs
Right. I was trying to afford the benefit of the doubt in every possible way.
At the very best, theoretically, this type of farming is as efficient as the
usual kind. In reality, it's much worse, always.

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minthd
Let's not forget algae. Solazyme is already producing various food components
for food companies, from algae, in highly efficient and dense factories, and
at a competitive price.And i think with time it might be a cheap carbohydrates
source.

And those food components are much better than natural components - because
you can tailor the exact chemical composition of them.

And with technologies like molecular gastronomy, or making great meat
substitutes out of protein(like beyond meat), food components could become the
basis for a lot of food variety.

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ernestipark
Worth checking out - I'm an early adopter for the Grove aquaponics system
which is similar in idea but meant for individual homes
([http://grovelabs.io](http://grovelabs.io)). Not cost effective yet, but
hoping they continue to grow and refine their research and process to a point
that it will be in the near future.

~~~
hanniabu
Yeah man, multitrophic systems are the future. Hydroponics is just a stepping
stone.

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cjbenedikt
Vertical farming: Another 'solution' that won't work
[http://climateandcapitalism.com/2012/12/13/vertical-
farming/](http://climateandcapitalism.com/2012/12/13/vertical-farming/)

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icameron
I'm convinced after reading that. I knew about NASA researchers trying to grow
lettuce crops with LEDs to support long missions in space even in the 80s.
LEDs have come a long ways since then. I'm glad to see it happening today
commercially. Quick and low growing plants like lettuce and greens are well
suited for vertical farming. I haven't read specifically about it but I'm not
as convinced something with a long growing cycle and tall plant such as corn
or sugarcane is as feasible, so it will continue to be a regional crop where
it's naturally supported. I'm just happy to see the innovation and full scale
use of LED indoor growing!

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epalmer
Page must be dying from Hacker News hits

ERR_CONNECTION_CLOSED

For what it is worth I have been casually reading about vertical farming and
think this may be a very valuable technique to feed more people with less
resources.

I'm looking forward to reading this blog post when it is accessible.

~~~
hellbanner
It's up for me, try again. In disagreement with the posts above -- I think
innovation in food production is possible, neccessary, and looks like it is
underway.

~~~
ewzimm
Where I live, the average farm loses money every year. The only reason farming
exists in its current form in this area is because of government subsidies.
There are big lobbying groups to make sure that specific methods are paid for
by taxes, even if they aren't efficient. Also, the average age of farmers is
over 60, so they are extremely unlikely to try innovative methods. Only once
the current generation dies off will there be any major changes, because right
now everything is prescribed and paid for.

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logfromblammo
A rational, fact-supported argument is not sufficient to convince some people
of anything.

If I want to convince _all_ of my friends, I will also need an emotionally-
loaded propaganda documentary with more anecdotal, scripted illustrations of
the human impact on a handful of stereotypical everyman characters.

I have been convinced for about 20 years that large-scale indoor farming will
become cost-competitive with standard industrialized farming around 2040. The
epic drought in California may have accelerated my estimate to 2035.

We won't be at the tipping point until a profitable cornfield is replaced by a
greenhouse-like structure with a roof 30m above ground level.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Exactly.

I remember a conversation I had with a friend of mine about vertical farming.
He's big into his food, cares about food quality.

Anyway, I bring it up, he's not impressed, in fact far from it. The impression
I got was that it ruined the emotional impact behind the origin of food.
Instead of growing in fields, in natural time-honoured traditional way (I
should mention at this point that my friend believed in buying organic, just
to nip the pesticides/herbicides argument in the bud), we'd be replacing that
with what amounted to growing in a lab.

If you're going to convince anyone, beyond tech heads and those that only care
about cost, you're going to need to address the story of food, its role in our
culture. I strongly doubt it would get anywhere close to the mainstream
without the type of emotionally-led marketing that logfromblammo suggests.

~~~
danielweber
Why do you need to "convince" anybody? If companies want to build urban farms,
let them compete and we'll see what happens.

My money says that if you are _really_ hung up about the energy transport
costs of food, you should just build an electric transport system into the
city, from the farm outside the city.

A lot of this research is very interesting for things like space colonies, so
I pay attention, but on earth it's a solution in search of a problem.

~~~
ZenoArrow
> "Why do you need to "convince" anybody?"

I don't. However, I was pointing out for those that want to try, there's more
to it than listing the technical benefits.

To use another example, most people accept that investment in public
transportation is a very good thing (both for the environment and the vitality
of a city), yet people still plow huge sums of money into their cars, because
cars = freedom. In cities like New York where many people don't seem to own
cars, is their freedom restricted? Doesn't seem that way. Cars only = freedom
if your other options are subpar.

Why bring this up? Reliance on cars is an example of what results when people
think individualistically, whereas investment in public transport (and
investment includes use) is an example of when people think collectively. Some
changes require an amount of consensus. Whilst I agree you could let companies
try it and let the market decide, I expect you'll encounter NIMBYism before
too long. It's no problem to me though, I've got no horse in this race, will
wait to see how it plays out.

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ryanmarsh
Take a look at pictures of actual vertical farms vs. artist concepts and
compare their use of natural light and then tell me if this is truly as
"sustainable" as they say. Growing things is more than getting the soil right.
It's (for most plants) the use of chlorophyll to make sugars which (again for
most plants) is harnessing the equivalent of sunlight.

Aquaponics are definitely sustainable and just downright awesome and we should
invest more in them, but without sunlight you're just running a power hungry
"grow op".

~~~
hanniabu
I'm working for aquaponic company Verticulture Farms and I couldn't agree with
you more. Multitrophic systems are definitely the way of the future.
Plants/fish/crustaceans, all grown organically and locally.

------
mikepurvis
_ ... there are no fertilizers needed. There are no pesticides needed. There
is no chemical runoff. Even if you make a worst-case assumption that each farm
will use synthetic nutrient solutions, these solutions are used in a closed,
recirculating system with no chance for environmental contamination._

Can someone explain how this is so? What is the alternative to a "synthetic
nutrient solution"?

~~~
hanniabu
The alternative is natural nutrients from plants rather than lab created
Burien which are essential chemicals. If you try a synthetic nutrient plant by
itself you probably won't think anything is wrong. But if you taste it side by
side from a natural source like nutrients from fish then the difference is
mind blowing. The synthetic nutrients really do change taste for the worse and
it makes me wonder if it has any affects on the body.

~~~
mikepurvis
I'm still not following. Are these "vertical farms" then aquaponics affairs,
where the fish tank waste is what feeds the plants? Or is it like organics,
where a crop like peas concentrates nitrogen from the air in order to
fertilize something else?

~~~
hanniabu
Aquaponics is one closed loop option for acquiring organic nutrients for the
plants. You can read more if you Google "organic vs synthetic nutrients" and
click the first link by The Grow Scene. They explain it pretty well there and
in only a few short paragraphs.

------
cousin_it
It seems like making more land for horizontal farming (converting unusable
land, reclaiming from the sea, etc.) should be way more cost-efficient. Heck,
even growing stuff on boats would be more efficient than using skyscrapers,
because of the free sunlight and water.

------
rikkus
Just in case anyone, like me, read the headline and wanted to see the old
'Green Desk' feature on Brass Eye, I found it here:

[https://youtu.be/usTT3RuWu_g?t=4m44s](https://youtu.be/usTT3RuWu_g?t=4m44s)

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nsxwolf
Let's build huge arrays of vertical farms on top of traditional farms!

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searine
It will never, ever, be able to out compete Dirt + Sun.

~~~
mikepurvis
That's my gut instinct— and there are so many secondary services which nature
provides you for free out there, like pollination.

And yet, the article does make some pretty compelling points, especially about
year-round yield, continuous yield, and isolation from environmental factors
like drought, pests, etc.

What's actually most exciting to me is greater integration of food production
directly into the places where people live and work. Why have a separate
vertical farm when it could be the two floors above your company cafeteria,
and the lettuce in your lunch literally never left the premises? _That_ is
really exciting to me.

------
bencollier49
"closed loop production cycle" \- this sounds like a perpetual motion machine?

~~~
mgberlin
I think they just mean that the waste materials can be used to provide inputs
to the next production cycle. Obviously the loop is not close because there is
energy coming in, and grown plants going out.

