What do you guys think of vertical farming?

3 years ago by Doctor_olo to c/solarpunk

Vertical farming, the best solution to support an ever growing population or just a scam?

IMHO it has a lot of potential but not being able to grow grains really is something that should be tackled sooner rather than later. But I could see this being used by self sustaining communities to provide lots of food while using very little space. And it's technically more environmentally friendly than just using vast stretches of land to produce the same amount of food.

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turboshadowcool 20 points 3 years ago

Honestly, this seems like a solution looking for a problem. We already have a lot of agricultural space available and in use. We just use that space very inefficiently to actually produce food. There are huge benefits to be gained from switching to sustainable farming, and probably a largely vegan diet too (just based on Ressource use alone). Once farming is focused on producing food and preserving nature, instead of creating profit we can look to further improvements. Even hydroponics or mixed use gardens are likely a better next step here. There simply isn't a need to cram our food production onto a wall yet, especially if that requires costly infrastructure made of difficult to recycle materials.

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poVoq 15 points 3 years ago

While I generally agree, I think you are over-looking transportation needs and all the externalities associated with that. Vertical farms can be for apartments, what backyard gardening is to less densely populated places.

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Spzi 1 point 3 years ago

Vertical suburbs? Less dense cities in turn increase transportation needs again.

I also think transportation is a rather insignificant part of food production, based on the stats and graphs I've seen.

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Doctor_olo 5 points 3 years ago

I see your point, but I do still think that vertical farming has its place in a solarpunk future maybe not in the sense of mass production but more personal like a veg garden or something similar.

Sidenote better than hydroponics is aquaponics providing more and better quality food.

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sudo 2 points 3 years ago

Once farming is focused on producing food and preserving nature, instead of creating profit we can look to further improvements.

https://youtu.be/D182B6C_WCc

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