

World’s Largest Indoor Farm Is 100 Times More Productive - JumpCrisscross
http://weburbanist.com/2015/01/11/worlds-largest-indoor-farm-is-100-times-more-productive/

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deeviant
A 100 times more productive and what, 1000 times more expensive?

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brd
"with 40% less power, 80% less food waste and 99% less water usage than
outdoor fields" Sounds like its less expensive. I'd imagine the upfront real
estate costs will nominal when annualized.

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deeviant
Those are just a few of a great array of costs and it mentions nothing of the
levelized cost difference.

That's not even taking into account that numbers are often treated with a
certain amount of... optimism, in these types of early stage projects.

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brd
I'm not sure why you're so convinced that this is an inferior means of
farming. It's generally accepted that modern day commercial practices are sub
optimal.

Fertilizer is one of the largest costs, it will absolutely be minimized in a
closed environment.

Water is a largely externalized cost but I'm sure that will change over time
and that too will be minimized in a closed system.

Land is another significant factor and this is designed specifically to
optimize yield per acre.

Running irrigation systems should be cheaper because of the condensed space
and lack of waste.

Labor should be cheaper because of the condensed space and more controllable
environment although perhaps the need for more specialized labor will offset
that benefit.

Transportation is another huge cost to modern agriculture and an approach like
this makes it much easier to grow food closer to its point of consumption.

Is there something I'm missing as far as where its clearly deficient to a
standard large scale farm? There's some infrastructure for shelving and the
upfront cost / electrical cost for the artificial lighting but considering
their figure on power consumption, it seems like the latter isn't an issue.

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deeviant
"It's generally accepted that modern day commercial practices are sub
optimal."

Modern day agriculture techniques feed billions of people. It's on a scale
that's hard to imagine.

"Is there something I'm missing as far as where its clearly deficient to a
standard large scale farm?"

* The cost of the land/building/facilities is going to be substantial, and would get much much worse if you try to do this at a scale that would even barley put a dent into the food production system. This gets far worse if you want to put them in urban areas to reduce transportation costs.

* It would take a great many years to achieve a scale that would change anything, even if the costs work out(which as I said earlier, I highly doubt).

* Any business model revolving around this idea will be under dire threat of any cost optimization/wins on the open air large scale farms. For a metaphor, take a look at the multitude of solar start-ups that went into the market thinking X cost-per-watt was competitive only to have chinese panels drop by 30% in a year, immediately putting them under(see solyndra). This technique can't just be competitive, it has to destroy open-air farming in terms of cost in order to be safe enough to place a bet on it big enough to change anything.

* I would like to see some solid research on the affects of artificial light on plants. Nutritional changes, in particular.

Don't get my wrong, I am into technological solutions, I just don't see this
panning out. For the record, I am in the automated ag industry, we build
robots that perform various tasks on and around the farm.

Solutions that I do see panning out in the near-term future in terms of ag
are:

* Autonomous/semi-autonomous farm robots/machines * Big data analytics, allowing farmers to make better/smatter/faster decisions. Things like smart crop selection based on data from projected weather patters and market conditions, crop cycle planning to better respond to water/market/field conditions, accurate yield prediction allowing better financial planning, etc. * GMO's that do something else other than allowing a farmer to douse a field in round-up or making a plant produce it's own pesticide. * The commoditization and expansion of "modern" farming technology to the various 3rd world countries.

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brd
I'm 100% in agreement with you that the current ag scene will barely notice
these new practices but I've been casually watching the industry for a while
and solutions like this one promise to fill some important niches.

The point you make about technology shifts is one that absolutely needs to be
acknowledged. I tend to look at big ag as stagnant but I know that's far from
the truth.

Really I'm just hopeful for a world where we see better quality produce (in
both taste and nutritional content) with less externalized costs. I don't care
how we get there as long as we get there. I just can't help but think we need
these smaller, more clever solutions to drive up demand for better practices
before big ag decides to do anything meaningful in that direction.

I've long thought about getting involved in the sustainable farming niche; if
you're interested, I'd love to chat sometime about how you see the industry
shifting over time.

