
Las Vegas vertical farm aims to produce over a million pounds of produce a year - anandaverma18
https://www.businessinsider.com/las-vegas-vertical-farm-bringing-opportunity-to-the-strip-2018-8?r=US&IR=T&utm_source=reddit.com
======
pvaldes
"aims to produce" is not the same thing as "produces"

~~~
eggie
This is another in a long, long series of breathlessly promoted
"urban"/"vertical" farming concepts. In virtually every case the description
is projection. The economies rarely work out except for leafy greens in
extremely dense urban regions without reliable access to countryside or
greenhouse options.

~~~
api
... or locally grown organic super-fresh superfood greens for a major tourist
economy like Las Vegas?

It could work for niche stuff, but energy costs is always what kills these
ideas for the mainstream market. Sunlight is free. If we had Mr. Fusion maybe
it could work.

Edit: I suppose it could work in the Middle East too where energy may be cheap
enough (solar, cheap gas) vs. the cost of shipping it from Europe or further
away.

~~~
eggie
It's true, this might be one of the optimal markets for this kind of farming.
You're right about the other niches. There will be a few. Blueberries in
Brooklyn. Us hipsters need our avocado toasts and rare fruit brunches in all
seasons.

With unlimited power, everything changes. We get the incredible luxury of
scientifically produced vegetables. They can be optimized to perfection in
harmony with consumer tastes. Every season brings a new designer crop...

Well, maybe it could happen without unlimited power. We can dream.

~~~
api
Yes. I must also add that Las Vegas and Dubai are in areas with tremendously
abundant year round solar power. There is rarely even a cloud in the sky. When
the sun is up these days upwards of 40% of the power in Southern California
can be solar. Not sure about Nevada but the potential is definitely there.

[http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/supply.aspx](http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/supply.aspx)

Around noon PST you'll see upwards of 11GW of solar. (This includes rooftop
installations if they have smart meters.)

Of course it's more efficient to just put the plant's leaves in the sun, but
water isn't free either and you lose far more water that way. I wonder if cost
of water in the desert could outrun the cost of indirect solar -> electricity
-> calories? It could be true in the US Southwest, but it could _definitely_
be true in Dubai or Saudi Arabia. In places like that desalination is one of
the only sources of fresh water, and that's likely more energy intensive than
indoor farming.

So yes it could work in a few markets, but it's not going to replace
conventional agriculture broadly.

------
neals
The key to successful hydrophonic farming is, surprisingly, marketing.

I've visited a couple of these in Europe. There's a lot of manual labor and
electricity involved and it's very expensive. The only way to make it work is
to sell your lettuce as '100% environmentally friendly, zero pesticides' and
ask 10x the price of 'regular' lettuce.

But honestly, I've never really tased the difference and I wonder if the
environmentally-friendly stuff holds true if you really look into it.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
the taste depends on the nutrient solution used in culture... some people
enjoy the "clean" taste of defined hydroponic medium, however there are
complex sugars esters and volatile organics that are responsible for the
flavour of the product... bioponic medium consists of organic substances humic
and fulvic acids that provide a product far superior to a bland hothouse
tomato taste... as far as environmentally friendly, there is considerable
plastics waste resulting from greenhouse operations that have a wastefull
process... hydroponic methods use, and reuse nutrient solutions and water as
well as minimal solid medium...couple this with a caring attitude and a
hydroponic operation can be very environmentally friendly if the factory farm
mentality is avoided...

~~~
geomark
About half a kilometer from my house in a rural area is a leafy greens farm
that has two sections, hydroponics and soil grown. Both are covered by nets
and are pesticide-free. They claim demand is for the soil grown is higher
because people prefer the taste. I don't really notice much difference.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
im curious, do you smoke? somepeople have very particular tastebuds... also
peatmoss "potting soil" is not soil it is artificial media but does have
"flavour" im wondering what is being considered soil, and what is hydroponic
media... true soil is mineral, organic matter, bacteria and fungi and thier
metabolic products...hydroponic media is some form of nutritional complement
in solution, often in an inert medium such as "rockwool" or free solution
aquaponics with no solid carrier just liquid. bioponics is a catch word of
sorts that describes something like the effluent from a compost heap adjusted
to physiological specifications for the crop in culture... it may be
interesting to try a "p3ps1 challenge" with different cultures espescially
with tomatoes and cucumbers...

~~~
geomark
I don't smoke. But it's not me anyway. It's what the growers tell me is
preferred by their customers, which are mainly local restaurants. The soil is
the local dirt that has been amended with compost so it's nothing special. The
hydroponic system they use is just roots dangling in closed tubes through
which hydroponic solution is pumped at regular intervals.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
ah so it sounds like aquaponic culture...that would make a very taste free
product. nutritional just the same but _^bland^_

~~~
geomark
Aquaponics is when you combine fish farming and hydroponics, circulating the
water from the fish pond which is full of fish poop to feed the plants, and
utilizing the plants to filter the water, in a semi-closed system. That's not
what they are doing at the nearby farm.

I had a fairly large aquaponics system for a while. 30 meter diameter pond
with tilapia and a long channel full of gravel that was planted with various
vegetables through which pond water was pumped at regular intervals. The pond
was large enough and had enough plants in it that it achieved balance on its
own without having to continuously run the pump. So maintenance was easy and
no fear of the fish dying. In fact, it got out of control with the tilapia
multiplying like crazy.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
some are like this, but not all... you ended up creating a large scale
biological fiter that rendered the tank filter obsolete other than to
eutrophize the fish tank environment[good] the basic play is to balance the
system of give and take between plants as a nitrogen sink, and a biological
nitrogen source... the cycle of nitrosomas and nitrobacter conversion of
ammoniacal substance to nitrite and nitrate available for plant assimilation
occurs in the particulate accumulated in the gravel bed... fish are
convienient and tasty but very often a compost tailings lagoon is used...there
is a wide acceptance of bio remediation of sewage, hor farm runoff in the
niagara escarpment area...

------
londons_explore
A million pounds works out to about 20 trucks of produce.

That's still pretty small by farming standards.

~~~
jaggederest
Just for reference, total consumption of leaf lettuce in the US is in the
neighborhood of 3 billion pounds annually. Leaf lettuce is the most valuable
vegetable crop, it runs about $0.45 per pound. So they're spending $30m on a
facility that can produce wholesale product worth $450,000 a year, gross
revenue... I'm not sure the math on that works out.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
around southern ontario, hydroponic leaf lettuce is close to $3.00 a head... a
head will mature in 3 weeks from transplant from starter trays... that means
21 heads of lettuce in some state of growth between leafling and finished
product if you do a continuous production culture... 8 inches is adequate
linear spacing for fancy leaf lettuce thus 168 linear inches per batch
repetition thats 14 feet or 2 units of 7 feet... almost everyone has the
spatial capacity to produce thier own continuous supply of leaf lettuce at
home, if they dont mind tending them as they would a common house plant...

Oh BTW ...how much does one pay for a nice ceaser salad nowadays?

~~~
sitkack
So why aren't you making a couch that extrudes lettuce? Deliver the starters
via Uber and Lyft.

~~~
m1573rp34130dy
get an old drawer from a captains bed a few pieces of 4" pipe a bag of your
favorite fertilizer (organic or othewise) and some full spectrum LED panels,
ready to go except for a wack old futon mattress to lay ontop... then lettuce
grow hmm, what would we grow hidden away under the couch?

------
rosege
Emirates is also building one in Dubai with the company Crop One Holdings
[http://croponeholdings.com/](http://croponeholdings.com/) Given that droughts
are becoming more common I see these initiatives as quite interesting.
[https://www.flyertalk.com/articles/emirates-is-building-a-
ma...](https://www.flyertalk.com/articles/emirates-is-building-a-massive-
vertical-farm.html)

------
robertnealan
Seems environmentally unfriendly to rely 100% on electricity in one of the
sunnier places in the country — you'd think there'd be a way to pipe in
daylight via fiber optic cords during the day, and transition to LEDs as the
sun begins to set and during the night.

That said I'm really excited to see vertical farming grow as a market, ideally
in denser cities like SF or NYC where proximity to the nearest farms can be a
few hours away depending on what you want to buy.

------
dccoolgai
Interesting. I've been watching a lot of Curtis Stone on Youtube lately. Would
highly recommend to anyone interested in this type of thing.

------
backspace_
This title is misleading. As pointed out, the article describes the companies
plans to reach 1 million pounds grown.

------
senectus1
I've always loved this idea.

Would love to setup a vertical city farm... I reckon it'd be an awesome job
and business.

~~~
anandaverma18
I certainly agree with you. The idea is indeed great but one has to be very
sure about its economies of scale when setting up a vertical farm. I have a
small setup in my apartment and it needs a lot of upfront setup cost and
recurring monitoring, electricity cost etc.

Vertical farms, if designed in a sustainable way, can be profitable in a long
run. Since it can be automated one should automate it completely saving on man
power.

Also, understanding of what crop to grow, how to grow and most important how
to sell it will make any vertical farm profitable.

~~~
raxxorrax
How do you solve the general problem with the lack of sunlight? Isn't using
artificial light extremely inefficient?

~~~
ForHackernews
It seems like for a large-scale commercial operation you could use solar
collectors on the roof and fiber optics to deliver sunlight to lower levels.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_solar_lighting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_solar_lighting)

~~~
imtringued
1m² of crop requires 1m² of sunlight. If you have 1000m² of crops and 100m² of
sunlight hitting the roof you will need to get that missing 900m² from
somewhere else.

------
dsfyu404ed
Read between the lines. This isn't about growing free range soy and cruelty
free tomatoes. The goal here is to have a proven method for growing stuff
indoors so that by the time they can use it for pot the kinks have already
been worked out and they can just scale right away and dominate a regional
market before the competition gets off the ground.

If they can sell to grocers in order to make the business equivalent of
sleep(untilpotbecomeslecal()) sustainable then good for them but that's not
really the primary goal here. Indoor vertical farming just doesn't work out
except in niche cases of very high margins or legal requirements that require
things be farmed indoors. City land is just too expensive to grow stuff on
unless you're growing a really lucrative crop. Other than pot that's not much
that meets one/both of those requirements.

edit: This isn't a condemnation, I'm just calling it like I see it.

~~~
koverda
There are already state licensed cannabis growers in Las Vegas.

------
cheez
Does anyone else think the stringent controls create fragility?

------
jokoon
While this is quite a cool project, it's only interesting if it can beat the
transporting cost of such produce.

------
imtringued
Is this sustainable at all? Good solar panels have 20% efficiency so this will
result in at least 5x more land use. Heck this doesn't work out even with 100%
efficiency. The same amount of farmland would still have to be covered in
solar panels. This may make sense on mars or on the moon but definitively not
on earth.

~~~
robbiep
Photosynthesis is about 1% efficient so when you combine optimal watering and
nutrition with 20-hr light cycles (last I looked at it, some darkness was
useful), you still have a highly efficient system

------
InclinedPlane
To put that into perspective, that's enough to feed about 700 people.

------
m1573rp34130dy
Hydroponic technique by any other name still smells as a liquified nutrient
extract solution... the method is millenia old, as in ancient greek and
babylonian... most people practice a form of modified slop culture on thier
windowsill... those who understand how far they can push a plant to yield more
, make out like gangbusters... nothing new in las vegas to see here citizen,
now move along...

------
m1573rp34130dy
"Oasis Biotech" ... if we find the c.v. for thier technicians we may see
something interesting[speculation] a biotech facility may use plants as the
carrier for novel genes in order to produce biochemical or pharmaceutical
products, even an oral vaccine bearing plant product...a classical "plantized"
operation in a lab and industrial compound is expensive to design construct
and operate... genetic engineering of plants can be cheap and forgiving in the
event of failures, thus not financially catastrophic... these sorts of
startups may be a good stock pick

