[In] their efforts to develop a system that sustainably supplies cities with a large share of their food, theorists and practitioners of vertical farming face insurmountable obstacles.
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Consider what it would take to provide fresh produce to just 15,000 city dwellers; that would be about 2 percent of the population of the District of Columbia.
That was the objective of a favorable 2013 analysis of vertical gardening by GIZ, a German engineering group. They estimated that the project would require a 150 x 150 square-foot building with 37 stories. It would cost a quarter billion dollars to construct and equip and would consume $7 million worth of electricity annually. Those estimates led them to conclude, โIt is possible to grow only high value crops for consumers who have disposable income for such products.โ
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In other words, such buildings would not serve 15,000 people of modest means. Were vertical gardeners ever to venture beyond leafy greens into growing a full range of vegetables, the sky-high inputs of capital, resources (especially electricity) and labor would limit the reach of their produce to a boutique market.
So the original aim of vertical croppingโs proponents โ to protect the soils of Americaโs farm country by taking much of that land out of productionยญ โ was well-meant but futile.
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: Enough with the vertical farming fantasies: There are still too many unanswered questions about the trendy practice
