It’s such a hot idea that IKEA and world-famous chef David Chang have invested in it but will Australians embrace this new food trend?

Charis Chang@CharisChang2

news.com.au FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Inside the world's largest indoor vertical farm

It’s pesticide-free, tastes great and can be grown using 95 per cent less water than conventional farming but will Australians be willing to pay more for food grown indoors?

Homewares giant IKEA and world-renowned Momofuku chef David Chang are betting they will be; they are among a number of investors putting money behind indoor vertical farming company AeroFarms.

The company has built the world’s largest vertical farm — in the US — and is now looking to Australia for possible expansion.

AeroFarms chief executive officer David Rosenberg is in Australia this week for the evokeAG conference, an event held by AgriFutures Australia in Melbourne to highlight new technologies, products and practices in the agriculture sector.

Mr Rosenberg told news.com.au the technology would enable places like Perth, where it’s difficult to buy locally grown food, to cultivate vegetables at scale.

“We can grow plants with a lot less water and arable land,” he said.

AeroFarms’ technology allows plants to be grown indoors without soil and using 95 per cent less water.

Its farm just outside New York City in Newark, New Jersey, has a grow room that is 30,000 square metres (about seven acres) and where salad greens are grown in stacks 12 layers high.

Through optimising temperature, water and nutrient delivery, Mr Rosenberg said they have been able to grow a plant in 14 days instead of the usual 30 days.

They can also turn over 25 crops a year because they are not restricted to growing in seasonal conditions, unlike conventional farmers who can generally only turn over their crops three times a year.

“What we can grow in an acre, they (conventional farmers) would need 130 acres,” Mr Rosenberg said.

The Newark farm covers an area the size of about four soccer fields so in order to produce a similar amount of crops, a conventional farm would need about 910 acres, or about 500 soccer fields.

Instead of being exposed to the sun, LED lighting is used to help the plants grow. Fertilisers and soil are replaced by hydroponic and aeroponic techniques that allow plants to get nutrients by sitting their roots in water, or misting them with water rich in elements like zinc. Other essentials are also provided: carbon dioxide gas is dispensed from canisters.

“We give them the right spectrum of light so they are getting the same things,” Mr Rosenberg said. “We break down what the plants want and we give it to them.”

This focus on data analytics to give plants exactly the right conditions to grow also means the taste of the food can be tweaked.

While they are not organic, AeroFarms’ greens are pesticide-free and can compete on taste and texture.

The technology has generated a huge amount of interest with AeroFarms raising $40 million in funding last year from companies like IKEA as well as individuals like David Chang and even former CIA director and retired US General David Petraeus.

Mr Rosenberg said AeroFarms managed to perfect the process for leafy greens about a year ago but they were still developing the model for other vegetables.

Another big challenge was convincing people to pay a premium for these products as the process was very energy intensive and capital expenses were also higher.

“In the US we need a 20 per cent premium to make the economics work,” Mr Rosenberg said.

In Australia, he believes the costs would be similar although this depends on how big the facilities are. Large operations make it more feasible to use automation to run the farms 24 hours a day and make them more economically viable.

However, not everyone is convinced that using huge amounts of energy to create artificial sunlight and control the climate is the best idea.

“There are questions about the sustainability of growing crops using electricity,” CERES Fair Food program general manager Chris Ennis told news.com.au.

Experts have pointed out that lettuces grown in traditionally heated greenhouses in the UK need an estimated 250 kilowatts per hour of energy a year for every square metre of growing area. A vertical farm needs a staggering 3500kW/h a year.

Mr Ennis said it may not make sense for farms to use huge amounts of coal-fired power to grow vegetables.

“We are asking ourselves, does it add up for the amount of lettuce that you get? We are really struggling with that.”

CERES is a not-for-profit community park in Melbourne that has been selling produce grown from its indoor vertical farm for about three years. It has been stunningly successful.

Mr Ennis said the indoor garden only took up about 100 square metres or less, but generated as much income as the rest of their 10,000sq m market garden.

“It’s incredibly productive,” he said. “We grow sunflower sprouts, pea sprouts and radish sprouts and they’re all certified organic. We supply the CERES shop and health food shops all over Melbourne,” Mr Ennis said

However, CERES’s process is different to AeroFarms’ as it still uses soil and sunlight to grow its plants.

Artificial lights are used in an old shipping container where seeds are germinated but afterwards the plants are moved to a poly tunnel that lets light in. Even in the shipping container there are only lights on the roof, rather than above every layer of plants.

Mr Ennis said the beauty of indoor farms was that you could control every aspect of the growing conditions and it used less water but there were still questions around the energy efficiency of growing that way.

“Does it make sense when we’ve got the sun?”, he said.

Continue the conversation @charischang2 | charis.chang@news.com.au