Water-Smart Farming: How Hydroponics And Drip Irrigation Are Feeding Australia

Water-Smart Farming: How Hydroponics And Drip Irrigation Are Feeding Australia

How energy-smart technology is allowing fresh vegetables to be grown in arid, isolated communities. Our Future of farming series is looking at the people, places and innovations in sustainable agribusiness in Australia

Is hydroponic farming the way forward for arid Australia? Photograph: Paul Miller/AAP

Oliver Balch 

Wednesday, 26 April 2017 20.01 EDT

Sydney Fresh, Organic Angels, Freshline, Box Fresh. It’s a wonder Australian supermarkets still stock vegetables, such is the explosion of veg-box delivery services. OK, they may be a bit on the pricey side, but the food is out-of-the-ground fresh, typically free of chemicals and refreshingly wonky. 

But for a veg-box scheme to work, the vegetables have to be grown locally. That effectively ruled out the arid wheatbelt towns of Western Australia. Or, it did, before Wide Open Agriculture opened a huge greenhouse-like facility to grow fresh vegetables. Boxes destined for domestic doorsteps have been leaving the Wagin-based site loaded with cucumbers, capsicums, tomatoes and the like.

Because we don’t rely on soil, we can osition our farm closer to centres of population

Philipp Saumweber, Sundrop

“We’ve had a lot of anecdotal feedback that we have brought the taste back to vegetables, particularly our tomatoes,” says Ben Cole, executive director at Wide Open Agriculture, the startup behind the initiative. “But our key is selling fresh vegetables in a region that doesn’t have many other local growers.”

The venture is tapping into growing consumer demand for food that is fresh and that doesn’t (environmentally speaking) cost the earth. It uses drip-irrigation technology, for instance, that requires only 10% of the water needed for open-field agriculture. In addition, the 5,400 square metre facility is equipped with a retractable roof and walls that open and close automatically, thus reducing water loss to evaporation.

The water used at the high-tech farm is sourced from natural surface water runoff that is directed into a series of dams before being pumped via a solar-powered system for use in irrigation. By capturing water high in the landscape, Cole argues, the wheatbelt’s first major vegetable producer is able to make use of it before it becomes saline.

“The wheatbelt has seen reductions in rainfall up to 20% over the last 20 years, so water scarcity is an issue for traditional wheat and sheep farmers,” says Cole, who holds a doctorate in environmental engineering and recently exited a successful social enterprise in Vietnam.

Wide Open Agriculture believes its agroecological approach to farming could usher in a new age of vegetable production in the wheatbelt. With its first harvest only just completed, it is already looking to list on the Australian Securities Exchange to raise finance for a second large-scale unit.

Another new player in Australia driving supply of water-smart food is Sundrop Farms. The Adelaide-based firm is the first company in Australia to develop a commercial-scale operation using hydroponic technology.

Sundrop Farms’ 65-hectare facility near Port Augusta in South Australia. Photograph: Sundrop

 Pioneered by companies such as BrightFarms and AeroFarms in the US, hydroponic farming requires no soil or natural sunlight. Instead, plants are grown in trays containing nutrient-rich water and encouraged to photosynthesise by low-energy LEDs. 

“Hydroponics is a thriving industry right across the globe, with produce being grown in a huge variety of environments” says Philipp Saumweber, a former investment banker who heads up the company. As if to prove the point, Sundrop has located its 65-hectare facility in an area of virtual desert near Port Augusta in South Australia.

One of the criticisms of the technology is that it is energy-intensive, what with all those indoor lights and automated heating and cooling systems. Sundrop has successfully ducked that charge by installing a concentrated solar power plant with 23,000 flat mirrors to meet most of its energy needs. 

Saumweber is quick to push the water-efficiency credentials of the indoor farm too. With precious little rain or subterranean water to draw on, Sundrop has opted to pump seawater from the ocean and desalinate it. Its renewably powered desalination plant generates around 1 million litres of fresh water every day. The company also uses the seawater as a natural disinfectant, reducing the need for pesticides. 

None of this comes cheap, mind. Sundrop’s Port Augusta farm cost a reported A$200m. Yet Saumweber insists this high upfront investment will be offset in the long run by lower operational costs, thanks to the use of cheaper renewable energy.

What can’t be argued with is the net result: 15,000 tonnes of tomatoes a year from a patch of land that is barely habitable, let alone productive. The prospect of siting such facilities inside cities is also a very real possibility, Saumweber adds. “Because we don’t rely on soil, we can position our farms closer to centres of population to greatly increase the efficiency of our supply chain.”

For the most part, however, water-smart technologies such as hydroponics and aquaponics (a related system that uses fish waste as an organic food source for plants) remain the preserve of hobby producers in their backyards. 

For Murray Hallam, a Queensland-based expert and lecturer on aquaponics, the sector struggles with being seen as “just for hippies and way-out vegans” – an image he insists is false. A cultural propensity to think “it’ll be all right, mate” also holds back people from taking the risk of water scarcity and climate change seriously with respect to future food production, he argues.

The country is missing a trick, he continues: “In a regular farm, it doesn’t matter how well you organise it, when you irrigate, about 70% of the water evaporates straight away. Then the water that does get into the soil usually ends up going down to the subsoil and leaking away … taking with it the nutrients and fertiliser.”

Two of Hallam’s students have gone on to create multimillion dollar aquaponic businesses: Mecca in South Korea, and WaterFarmers, which has farms in India, Canada and the Middle East. He fears it will take a food crisis for Australian consumers to step up en masse and demand similar innovative solutions from the country’s agricultural industry. 

Back amid the wheat fields of Wagin, Cole is more optimistic. Wide Open Agriculture is now looking to break into the local hospitality and retail market. It has opted for the brand name, Food for Reasons. For once a product that says what it is on the tin – or box.

Indoor Farmers Face Uncertainty Over Organic Labeling

APR 24, 2017 @ 06:03 PM

Indoor Farmers Face Uncertainty Over Organic Labeling

Debra Borchardt ,  CONTRIBUTOR

Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

Indoor farms can stack plants vertically and grow more crops than a traditional outdoor farmer. (Photo by Shutterstock)

The National Organic Standards Board have kicked the can down the road on hydroponic and aquaponic farming. The group was supposed to decide on April 21 if the systems can be considered organic. The only decision they made was to learn more about the farming process and have pushed their decision until the fall.

This has left current hydroponic and aquaponic farmers that consider themselves organic in limbo. They can continue to call themselves organic until a decision is reached, but in the meantime the uncertainty is troubling.

“It's more about organic, certified farmers wanting to maintain their market share,” said JP Martin of GrowX, an aeroponic farming system. “The fertilizers are identical,” he said, “So the argument that they use different nutrients breaks down.”

Terra Tech is an indoor farming company that grows leafy greens and its crop that has some soil exposure has been certified organic. Chief Executive Officer Derek Peterson said, "If they came back and had some sort of ruling that disallowed organic, it would be tremendously hurtful. We would lose shelf space." He noted that the demand for non-organic produce continues to drop because the price premium is down for organic. "It's more affordable so the demand has increased," he said.

He's right. The market has grown tremendously. The USDA said that there was a 13% increase between the end of 2015 and 2016 of organic farms. This is the highest growth since 2008.

The point of contention is whether food grown without soil can be considered organic. The USDA admits that obtaining organic certification for crops is challenging and the guide is over 60 pages long. There is a lot of detail regarding the soil, but there isn't a hard and fast rule that the food must be grown in soil.

“It's really about where the nutrients are coming from and less about the methodology,” said Martin. He said it just boils down to money and market share because hydroponic farming has been around for years. If anything, the indoor farming is much more organic than outdoor farming according to Martin.

A Self-Proclaimed City Boy Is Helping Farmers Grow Their Businesses

A Self-Proclaimed City Boy Is Helping Farmers Grow Their Businesses

April 24, 2017

Written by Erin Booke, The Dallas Morning News

Nick Burton is a self-proclaimed city boy, a businessman first and a farmer second. He’s also an educator, a mentor and the kind of friend that wants others to succeed.

When someone is struggling with their business and needs some advice, people often say, “Oh, do you know Nick? You should really talk to Nick.”

Burton, 39, runs Blue Collar Paris Victory Gardens in Paris, Texas, where he grows vegetables hydroponically and in soil. It used to be a nursery but now functions as the source of his subscription-based salad delivery business, Victory Lunch Club.

A New Mexico native, Burton moved to Texas in 2001. He started a lawn and landscaping business and grew from there. The “self-development junkie” says he became addicted to business coaching, which ranges from speaker training to technical expertise to image consulting.

“Whenever I got outside coaching, that’s when my business took off,” he says. “And whenever I couldn’t afford it was when I needed it most.”

Nick Burton stands in a high tunnel greenhouse at Paris Victory Gardens in Paris, Texas. In addition to Paris Victory Gardens, Burton has started State of the Soil to help other farmers start and grow their businesses. 

(Smiley N. Pool/Staff Photograher)

State of The Soil

Now Burton's the coach. Earlier this year, he launched another business, a passion project called State of the Soil. The series of virtual seminars is designed to educate farmers on business and marketing tactics. Recordings of the webinars are available any time online for a fee, but live webinars are available for free a few times a year. (The next free weekend is May 26-28.) As a farmer, Burton feels obligated to pass along where he has made mistakes and to give back to the agricultural community.

“Farmers are not used to having to pay for training because of the USDA and other programs,” Burton says. “But with that they are not getting great education, especially when it comes to the business side of things.”

Farming, by nature, can be a solitary career choice — and a calling for many — that’s full of trial and error and a lot of learning the hard way. Farmers are not used to networking or asking for help, and they're driven more by pride in their work than by market demands.

“I want to give people permission to tell their story, and sometimes I have to give people permission to make a profit," Burton says. "But a lot of these are small family farms, and if they don’t succeed, they are going to lose it all.”

Nick Burton demonstrates how hydroponically grown lettuce is harvested in a grow house at Paris Victory Gardens.  

(Smiley N. Pool/Staff Photographer)

No Whining Allowed

Burton is all about the tough love, however. He wants to help farmers build a community full of collaboration, innovation and support, but only if they are willing. No whining allowed.

“When we didn’t have good sales, I didn’t blame the market, I blamed myself,” he says. “Many people just grow what they like, but they have to grow what the market demands. It’s not about the farmer, it’s about the client.”

Burton doesn’t advocate one type of farming, even though there’s often infighting and debate among farmers about topics such as hydroponics vs. soil. “Whenever farmers say these things publicly, they are not helping each other out,” he says. “Everyone is so passionate about what they do, but there’s no one right way to do everything. Unless you’re out there just spraying chemicals on everything, I don’t have a problem with it.”

Red Butter lettuce seedlings sprout in a grow house at Paris Victory Gardens. 

(Smiley N. Pool/Staff Photographer)

Network of Experts

And while Burton runs State of the Soil, he doesn’t do it alone. He has tapped others in the agriculture community to share their stories and expertise. There are about 38 speakers for 2017 (and more than 40 for 2018) who will talk about such topics as market development, funding, restaurant sales, farmers market sales, media relations, food trends, farm-to-table events, social media, photography, technology and even work-life balance. An all-access pass is $129, and you can watch the webinars any time.

Jeff Bednar, owner of Profound Microfarms in Lucas, teaches a seminar on agricultural real estate for State of the Soil. He owned a real estate company and then branched out into real estate education before deciding to buy land and start growing. He, his wife, Lee, and his two young daughters grow vegetables, mostly leafy greens, hydroponically, aquaponically (with fish) and even vermiponically (with worms).

Andrea Shackelford, executive chef at Harvest Seasonal Kitchenin downtown McKinney, teaches a seminar on selling to restaurants and developing relationships with chefs. Tim Kelly of SunTx Capital in Dallas offers details on funding and investing. Other speakers are from across the country and around the globe.

Nick Burton walks through a grow house at Paris Victory Gardens. 

(Smiley N. Pool/Staff Photographer)

Not Just for Newbies

State of the Soil clients have ranged from newcomers with no growing background to longtime farmers looking for that extra push. “I see it as a very healthy mix,” Burton says, “people interested in farming for all kinds of reasons.”

Terry Foster of Houston runs Home Town Roots, an urban, indoor vertical farm that specializes in greens and supplies restaurants. Foster, 60, left his corporate job in the oil fields in 2014 to start a second career because he’s “old, tired and crusty,” he says, and “has lost all his mind but still has a strong back.”

He heard Burton speak and then signed up for State of the Soil. He says what he learned was worth much more than he paid. 

“The knowledge I had of social media would fit on half a pinhead,” Foster says. “He’s trying to show us dinosaurs how to use social media to market ourselves.”

Foster has since updated his website and developed a Facebook page and and Instagram account.

Plants waiting for their new greenhouae home. Getting close.

In 2016, Piper Klee of McKinney started Urban Dirt Co., building raised-bed gardens for people in their backyards and helping maintain them. Klee had a background in corporate sales, not farming, so she needed to pick someone’s brain.

“Nick is full of information and knows people. He started giving me information, and we spent hours driving around, meeting people,” she says. “People give away information for free in this industry. They want people to succeed. They are generous with their information, and Nick is more generous than most.”

Her biggest takeaway from the State of the Soil classes was encouragement. “It was good to see that I’m not the only one doing this,” she says. “And it wasn’t just people who’d been farming their whole lives. There were accountants and bankers turned growers.”

Klee is originally from Colorado, where she says almost everybody grows food in their yard. North Texas is on the cusp of this movement, she says, and there’s just enough information to get going.

“That’s why we have to have State of the Soil because we are not Colorado or Oregon,” she says. “We have to find a way to share information.”

And Burton clearly doesn’t mind sharing. He sees it as an obligation. “I’ve got a complete abundance mentality,” he says. “I think there’s room for everyone.”

Sustainable Farming Blossoms In The Lowcountry

Sustainable Farming Blossoms In The Lowcountry

SUMMERVILLE, S.C. (WCIV) — The sun is rising on a new form of farming in the Lowcountry.

In the heart of Summerville, there's an up and coming farm that sits in a residential neighborhood.

Stefanie Swackhamer and her team at Tiger Corner Farms says their whole operation is one big science experiment. 

"Traditional farmers grow in the dirt," she said. "Hydroponic farmers grow in the water."

Chief Engineer Evan Alusie said the 40-foot crates allow them to farm in an environmentally friendly way.

“Indoor farming gets red of the use of manure-based fertilizing so you reduce the risk of pathogens to humans,” he said.

Inside each crate, lettuce and other leafy plants are blooming at an unbelievable size.

“The roots hang in the air, and get misted every so often," Stefanie said. "That's how they gain their nutrients to be able to grow.”

They use LED lights to stimulate the growth of their plants.

One benefit to container farming is the ability to grow plants outside of their traditional season.

“Lettuce, you can't grow in the summer here, it's way too hot outside." Matt Daniels explained. "In here, everything is temperature controlled. The lights are on a set schedule for optimal growth.”

They’re growing fresh vegetables available to folks right here in the Lowcountry, putting the veggies in the mouths of those in need.

Stefanie, a former high school teacher, said she wanted to plant seeds outside of the classroom.

“There are a lot of students that don't have good quality produce available to them on a regular basis,” she said. "Right now everything we harvest gets donated back into the community."

The team at Tiger Corner is looking for interns. Students who are interested in S.T.E.M. are wanted. You can contact them at tigercornerfarmsmfg.com.

Indoor Growing Is ‘Bringing Back Failed Varieties’

Indoor Growing Is ‘Bringing Back Failed Varieties’

Urban farms are allowing Rijk Zwaan to grow varieties that fell short in past crop trials due to weak disease resistance

Indoor growing with LEDs is allowing salad breeders to bring back high-performing varieties that didn't have strong enough disease resistance in crop trials, a city farming expert has revealed.

Indoor growing at facilities such as GrowUp Urban Farms in London has allowed plant breeder Rijk Zwaan to reinstate certain salad varieties and boost product quality and consistency, said Philips’ programme manager for city farming, Roel Jansson.

“Growing in indoor climate cells means there are no pests, no weather changes, no bugs,” he said. “Everything that was developed by Rijk Zwaan in previous years but maybe didn’t have enough disease resistance can be used indoors because here we don’t have disease. We can get better taste, better colouration, faster growth.”

Philips has a programme with fellow Dutch company Rijk Zwaan to screen different varieties to find out which are best for indoor growing and which LED light spectrum they respond best to.

While he accepts that indoor growing will never fully replace traditional salad outdoors or in polytunnels, he sees big potential for vertical growing in fresh-cut pre-packed salads.

“Indoor growing is the future for growing processed produce like fresh-cut pre-packed salads because you can grow bug-free and with stable nitrates,” he said. “You can predict shelf life, texture, quality because you always get the same product.”

In wholehead lettuce, Janssen believes opportunities are more limited since consumers are already used to washing the product before eating it.

“In Europe we could produce a full head of lettuce that you don’t need to wash anymore,” he said, “but people are used to washing it anyway so the added value would probably be limited.”

He added: “There is already a market [for wholehead lettuce you don’t have to wash] in North America and Asia Pacific but in countries with really high horticultural standards like the UK, Netherlands and Scandinavia I don’t think we would easily replace a greenhouse.”

Produce from indoor farms is typically twice the price, costing around the same as organic produce, however this could reduce in future as LEDs become cheaper and more efficient and higher-yielding varieties are developed.

App-Controlled, Vertical Farming For Limited Indoor Space

App-Controlled, Vertical Farming For Limited Indoor Space

New smart farming system CityCrop is a vertical hydroponics set-up that allows growers to make best use of limited space and monitor their plants via app.

3 Apr 2017

For city dwellers worldwide, finding space to grow their own herbs, vegetables and flowers is a near-constant search. Athens-based CityCrop has created a smart solution. Using vertical hydroponics (a growing system based on water, not soil), growers can farm a variety of crops indoors and with minimal square footage. The vertical farm is completely climate controlled, uses LED lights to promote rapid growth and connects to the app with wifi, making it easy for farmers to manage their crops remotely.

The app provides full control over the care of the plants, allowing for adjustments to water cycles, humidity, temperature and lighting. Should a problem crop up, the community of users can provide advice and tips, and a plant doctor is on hand to diagnose via photograph. Each farm contains two trays that hold 12 plants each, and CityCrop provides certified organic seeds with each order. The first farms are expected to ship in September 2017.

Community gardens are another method urban growers are using to get closer to their food. In Sweden a green pavilion not only grows food for locals, it provides a shady place to rest and relax, and a bigger project in the US can feed up to 150 people and includes all necessary equipment for off-grid, smart food management. What are the common ingredients needed for up-scaling production amongst all such successful community farm projects?

Website: www.citycrop.io
Contact: hello@citycrop.io

Growing Green: From Cannabis To Lettuce

Growing Green: From Cannabis To Lettuce

March 31st, 2017

James Miner, Sasaki

There has been a lot of discussion recently about the impact the cannabis industry is having on real estate throughout the U.S. Most of that discussion has focused on the reinvigorated market for underutilized or vacant warehouses near urban centers, which are being turned into indoor marijuana farms as more states legalize recreational use of marijuana. Beyond the near-term real estate boom for industrial space, there is also great potential for the cannabis industry to influence another key market that is getting more and more traction in our cities: local foods. And no, it’s not just because consumption of marijuana tends to induce hunger in many people.

Many indoor marijuana farms use hydroponic growing systems to control light, heat, humidity, and nutrients to be able to produce a more consistent product. This same technology is also increasingly used to grow other leafy greens (the kind we eat in salads) and other highly perishable produce, the vast majority of which is grown in California and shipped across the country in refrigerated trucks. Seeking a more sustainable model, more and more New England farmers have taken up hydroponic farming and are now seeing increased demand for locally grown produce that can be harvested and delivered to your plate on the same day. But, like any emerging business, there are economic challenges to this business model–and that is where cannabis can help.

Because the value of a pound of cannabis is significantly higher than a pound of romaine lettuce, the operating costs of hydroponic farming are less of a barrier for marijuana farmers. The biggest cost for traditional hydroponic farmers–other than capital costs to get a facility up and running–tends to be electricity. Indoor, controlled-environment farming takes a lot of energy to maintain consistently optimal temperatures and light levels. Even as the these costs continue to decline as LED technology become both more affordable and efficient, energy costs tend to be the factor that puts most hydroponic farmers out of business. This is less of a problem if you are growing marijuana, as the market for the product makes the operation viable.

Indoor marijuana farms do have other hurdles to clear, however, which means it is still risky business. There is a lot more compliance work that needs to be done to grow cannabis, and many cannabis entrepreneurs have to pay thousands of dollars a month to maintain their bank accounts to be able to legitimize their profits. In the end, cannabis farmers have the same incentives to drive down production costs as all other hydroponic farmers do. So, as we see a growth in the number of hydroponic cannabis facilities, we should also see acceleration in the development of technology that is used to grow marijuana, which will improve efficiency and lower operating costs. That should be very good news for the local foods industry. But why should anyone else care?

There is evidence of the growing interest in locally-sourced food all around us: farmer’s markets, public markets, community-supported agriculture (CSA) memberships, and farm-to-table restaurants are all on the rise. Here, in New England, there are several factors which make indoor farming a key part of the local foods movement:

1) Our outdoor growing season is shorter than other places in the country, and indoor farming allows us to grow some foods all year round;

2) The transportation costs for some of the foods traditionally grown on the west coast (lettuce, leafy greens, tomatoes, and strawberries) can be eliminated if those same foods are grown indoors locally; and,

3) We have the highest concentration of urban population centers in the country, and these cities will certainly benefit from indoor farms that reduce reliance on food that has to travel great distances.

If indoor agriculture gets a boost from the cannabis industry like we think it will, there is even more good news from a development perspective. As most developers that work in cities will tell you, food is playing an increasingly important role as a driving force in the retail experience and branding of new urban districts. This is, in large part, due to the fact that the average American now spends more money dining out than they do at the grocery store. And, not only has the restaurant scene boomed in recent years, but it has also steered away from the large, national chains that used to anchor new developments, focusing instead on local culinary talent: rising chefs crafting seasonal menus based on locally-sourced ingredients. With this booming interest in local foods, new technologies in indoor, environmentally-controlled, hydroponic growing systems will afford consumers increasing access to hyper-local, hyper-fresh ingredients.

To test our theory about the influence of food on the urban experience, Sasaki issued a survey of 1,000 people who both live and work in one of six dynamic U.S. cities—Boston, Chicago, New York, Austin, San Francisco, and Washington DC. We asked what they like most about their cities, and urbanites across the country agree on a few things: they want great food. 82%  of respondents cited their city’s culinary offerings as a positive attribute, and there was agreement across all six cities that the primary motivator for exploring a new neighborhood would be to try a new restaurant! So, keep an eye on the cannabis industry–it could benefit you in ways you may never have imagined.

James Miner, AICP, managing principal, Sasaki, Watertown, Mass.

Federal Realty Bringing Hydroponic Shipping Containers To A Shopping Center Near You

Federal Realty Bringing Hydroponic Shipping Containers To A Shopping Center Near You

Mar 29, 2017, 7:45am EDT

Updated Mar 29, 2017, 8:27am EDT

Michael Neibauer: Associate Editor Washington Business Journal

If shipping containers can be reused as housing, why not retrofit them for farms, too?

Rockville-based Federal Realty Investment Trust (NYSE: FRT) has struck up a partnership with a Boston-based company to bring farms contained in retrofitted shipping containers to select shopping centers across the United States.

VIEW SLIDESHOW

The partnership with Freight Farms, according to a release, "empowers anyone to use this technology while repurposing Federal Realty's unused parking spaces as a place to locally and sustainably produce food that benefits the shopping centers' tenants, customers and community."

Freight Farms produces what it calls the "Leafy Green Machine," a "complete hydroponic growing system capable of producing a variety of lettuces, herbs and hearty greens." The 40 x 8 x 9.5 shipping containers, weighing 7.5 tons each, include climate technology and growing equipment — LED light strips, closed-loop water system, multi-planed airflow — to ensure a regular harvest, Freight Farms claims.

The Leafy Green Machine costs $85,000, plus an estimated $13,000 a year to operate. The containers consume about 100 kWh of energy per day. With that, plus water, Freight Farms says a farmer can harvest, for example, more than 500 full-size heads of lettuce per week.

"Finding the right location is a major hurdle for most new farmers," Caroline Katsiroubas, Freight Farms' marketing director, said in the release. "By partnering up with Federal Realty, we are eliminating a large barrier to entry for individuals looking to grow fresh produce for their local communities."

Federal Realty will offer parking spaces for rent to freight farmers, providing, perhaps, opportunities to partner with restaurants and grocery stores.

It is unclear whether any Greater Washington shopping centers will be selected initially for the shipping container rollout, expected this spring, though the program is expected to be expanded eventually nationwide. Federal Realty representatives were not immediately available for comment.

Federal Realty's properties in Greater Washington include Pike & Rose, Bethesda Row, Rockville's Courthouse Center and Federal Plaza, Free State Shopping Center in Bowie, Gaithersburg Square, Friendship Center in Friendship Heights and Sam's Park & Shop in Cleveland Park, and Graham Park Plaza and Barcroft Plaza in Falls Church.

Michael Neibauer oversees our real estate coverage and edits stories for the website and print edition.

Urban Farmers Catch New Train

March 24, 2017

The urban farming movement is taking a new twist, or rather, is on a new track. Growers are producing crops in refitted freight train cars, using hydroponics and automated systems equipment.

Each former freight car costs $85,000, not including shipping, with each “controlled environment” container producing an estimated average annual profit of $39,000. A 320-square-foot car is capable of producing roughly what a three-acre farm could, while using 95% less water than traditional farms.

Boston-based Freight Farms, the manufacturer of the equipment, says the most popular destinations for the 7.5-ton high-tech freight cars are urban areas across the country. The movement recently expanded into Arizona, where two urban farmers are growing crops in the cars.

The goal is to bring viable, space-efficient farming techniques to all climates and skill levels year-round. Quality and sustainability is enhanced, since produce travels shorter distances too.

Urban Farming Insider: Understanding Organic Hydroponics With Tinia Pina

Urban Farming Insider: Understanding Organic Hydroponics With Tinia Pina

Tinia Pina is the founder and CEO of Renuble, a company started in 2011 that develops hydroponic fertilizer 100% derived from organic food waste inputs. 

Renuble helps hydroponic growers increase yields with a wide variety of urban farming crops grown hydroponically in large metropolitan areas like New York City, where Renuble is based.

We interviewed Tinia to discuss:

- the basics of organic hydroponic fertilizer for beginning urban farmers
- some brand names she hears often for lighting, growing medium, common urban farming products
- and more!

___

Introduction

UV: Can you start off by talking about Re-Nuble and how it started? What's your mission?

Tinia: I founded Re-Nuble in 2011, the whole premise behind that was to try to increase access to more nutritious options, primarily in cities, because I saw that's were the trend was as far as macroeconomics of people migrating towards (cities). 

So, how can we make food, especially nutrient dense food, more affordable, and by doing that, making use of the abundant food waste in New York City and more efficiently serve the needs of food production. 

My vision to achieve that was re-purpose or up-cycle the reclaimed nutrients from food waste and at the time New York City was spending 33 million dollars (per year) to export its food waste. 

We thought that by manufacturing value added, organic liquid fertilizers, primarily within the hydroponic industry, because there was definitely, and still is, a demand to grow with organic inputs, it is challenging... but we've proven that you can achieve comparable grow results. 

Granted, the nutrient management side still takes a bit of a learning curve to adopt, before (using this type of fertilizer is really seamless. 

So the goal is to indirectly increase food production in cities so that we can cover the crisis of food with more supply.

UV: You mentioned the learning curve for hydroponics, can you talk about what that entails? Obviously, with the company being around since 2011, you have a really good perspective on how hydroponics have been trending in the urban farming setting since then. What's your perspective on that? 

Tinia: We started in 2011 with a different business model, we pivoted into hydroponics because the problem was more prevalent with using organic fertilizer and meeting that demand, (the pivot was) only as of 2015. 

The challenge with organics or anything that's biologically derived is because it's so natural, you can't have the precision that you have with a synthetic fertilizer where it's already in its ionic form and readily available to the plant. 

(With synthetic fertilizer), you know exactly to the parts per million what ionic nitrogen or phosphate or mineral is available to the plant. 

With biologicals, a lot of the decomposed matter, for example, in ours, we have organic certified produce waste, that decomposed matter still goes through a degradation when it is subjected to a hydroponic reservoir (unlike synthetic fertilizer). 

So (biological fertilizer) is still decomposing when you're in a hydroponic reservoir, and that lessens the ability to have precision and know exactly how much your pH or EC will be, especially within the first 1 or 2 weeks of growing, and that tends to stabilize after that. 

UV: When you say "the first 1 to 2 weeks" what is that 1-2 weeks referring to? Is it to after application of the fertilizer? 

Tinia: When the fertilizer is bottled, we're guaranteeing, a six month shelf life, so it is pH stable (pre application), and then when you dilute it in your hydroponic reservoir, it does go through a natural decomposition because the microbes are active again, so to answer your question, the pH and EC swing after application into the hydroponic solution due to microbe activity, so you're unable to say "you can expect with certainty a pH of 6.5 within the first 2 weeks simply because biological fertilizer has to normalize. 

We've shown historically, it's at that two week mark, that your EC swings, anywhere from .8 to 3, then tends to normalize, and that's only for hydroponic reservoirs. 

In soil, because you have the soil and you have a medium that diffuses, the microbes act differently in the soil medium, just like they would in rockwool or similarly in coco coir. How the organic fertilizers act in those substrates has less effect on your EC and your pH.

UV: You touched on a ballpark EC range, what is a range for pH (for hydroponic mediums)? Does it depend on the crops you're growing? 

Tinia: So what we do with our product line, we have an Away We Grow, which is a grow formula, True Bloom, for flowering, and fruiting crop formula, and a supplement which does really well with microgreens but it's a supplement at the end of the day. 

So we advise (pH level in hydroponics) on a benchmark. With biologicals (fertilizers) you aren't able read EC technically because there are no mineral salts, but we show based on our own trials that EC of 1.8 for butterhead leafy lettuce for example, it will be optimal to maintain that EC for the 4 or 5 week duration that you're actually cultivating it for. 

Then we prescribe a pH range (only) if you were using synthetics. 

UV: To clarify, the reason why you can generate this data on EC and others can't is because your essentially doing some type of simulation? Is that a fair way to say how you derive your EC benchmark of 1.8? You essentially said with the EC that you can't technically measure it, then you said is you guys do project it for the edification of the customer. What are you doing that the customer can't do as far as simulating EC? 

Tinia: The customer should already be measuring their hydroponic solution for pH and EC, the only big difference is, say (For example), you often have a pH stick that also measures for EC, if you were to subject it to a reservoir that has our nutrients in it (organic fertilizer), it's going to "dial" or measure an EC value, but, there really is no salts that are in the solution, so the (reading) isn't accurate. 

So what we do is project the EC so that we can tell you what to look our for, but (at first), there isn't a true measurement because technically there's no salt's in there at the end of the day. 

UV: SO this at the end of the day, is a very technical aspect of hydroponic nutrients? 

Tinia: Yes. With organics in general, it can be grown just as effective, as far as leaf size and harvest weight, it can take a little more time to get the same harvest weight compared to synthetics, and that's expected because it's a slower uptake process. 

But you can grow with organic fertilizer just as you can grow with synthetic fertilizer. This same reason is why Re-Nuble has gotten so much interest - people want to have a more viable alternative to synthetic hydroponic fertilizer, it's the same with food and medicine, it speaks to the same cause (to not rely on synthetics).

UV: For people who are looking at the unit economics, cost and benefit analysis, maybe they're thinking about starting their own urban farming hydroponic operation, what do you look at when you're looking at the cost of say, a biologic fertilizer compared to say, a synthetic one? 

When crops are grown and harvested, what do you typically see as the mark-up for the organic hydroponic produce you're typically helping your customers grow? 

Tinia: We've seen to date that just organic or natural branded crops tend to command a ~44% pricing premium. 

That mainly pertains to metropolitan areas, we've done less testing with rural, traditional farmland areas. 

Now, (on the unit cost side), you will notice that with organic hydroponics you will typically need more applied fertilizer than with synthetic fertilizer. 

As I mentioned earlier, this is because synthetic fertilizers already provide the nutrients in ionic form, which just means it's readily available for the plant to pick up, whereas with organics, there's still a requirement for the plant to convert (the organic waste based fertilizer) into a form that can be picked up. 

So what that essentially means is that you will need more organic fertilizer to get to the same needed concentration, compared to synthetic fertilizer. 

I typically estimate you will need 20% more of the organic fertilizer than with synthetics, but if you're selling the (organic) urban farmed produce, and you can sell it higher, it's typically worth the cost!

UV: So you're applying 20% more, on a unit basis does organic hydroponic fertilizer cost the same amount as synthetic hydroponic fertilizer? How does it compare? 

Tinia: It depends on the production scale, the water, the temperature. It does become technical to answer that question because all of these variables, water, temperature, the crop type sometimes, the moisture, the air in the actual grow space, can slightly increase or slightly decrease the nutrient consumption. 

So I can't give a (generalized) baseline for unit cost unfortunately.

UV: Another thing I get asked about is, especially for setting up a hydroponic system, is regarding the most commonly used / popular brands, I'm not asking you to talk as much about the fertilizer but when you're interacting with customers, what are some of the common names you see them using for the actual hydroponic system, for the tanks, for lighting, what are some of the popular names that you're hearing about more often? 

Tinia: What I'm hearing from people, anywhere in between New York City, Florida, DC, and a couple people on the west coast, for lighting I've heard Lumigrow. They tend to be a popular brand on the commercial side as well as hobbyists. 

For the organic base (hydroponic nutrient fertilizer / "grow formula"), depending on what you're growing, people have said Pure Blend, which is part of Botanicare, that's a brand that we directly compete with, and we've shown better yields for some crops for Botanicare, the main differentiation between Runuble and Botanicare is that Renuble has 100% organic certified inputs whereas they say they have an organic base but they do incorporate synthetics into their (fertilizer) formulation. 

On the medium side, I hear Growdan (rockwool cubes) a lot, with hydroponics, surprisingly users taking a blend of perlite and mixing it with cocoa coir, kind of a hybrid set up, on the soil side, what's been popular is Batch 64, depending on what your growing, they have Batch 64 and then Waste Farmers. 

The reason why I'm speaking (about) these brands is because they (the brands above) are for people interested in sustainable grows, and those that have more of an organic alignment.

UV: I like to finish up with some rapid fire questions. What's a company in the urban farming space that your excited about / that you think is onto something, that you've been following, maybe a CEO that you've been following in the space?

Tinia: One is called Farm.One. Instead of the retrofitted shipping containers they take microfarms and they provide specialized growing services but focusing on really exotic herbs. So they're really taking an angle of (growing for) culinary art to a whole other level and not just producing your typical commodity crop.

UV: The next question would be what's your favorite fruit or vegetable? 

Tinia: Strawberries.

UV: What's your favorite book relating to urban farming? I know that's specific and there may not be that many books, so if you don't have an idea for that what's one of your favorite books in general, one that is most gifted or that you most recommend. 

Tinia: I have quite a few! There are books on my bookshelf that I haven't even read yet but I'm wanting to. But answer your question, "The Vertical Farm", by Dickson Despommier, which is cliche now.

UV: The last question is, what's something you disagree with or think there's a misconception about in the urban farming industry or hydroponic industry that is generally accepted as being true?

Tinia: It's less of the hydroponic industry but more of the agricultural industry in general, but I'm not sure if you know, but this April 17th, anything hydroponically or aquaponically grown that wants to obtain organic certification is being voted as to whether it can obtain that certification. 

So the contention that I want to bring up is that hydroponics and aquaponics, anything in the controlled environment industry, can be successfully synergistic with conventional ag. I think right now, because there is a market, it does impact a lot of people's bottom line. If they open up the organic certification process, I think a lot of people think they have to be competitive and contentious but they can very much complement each other (conventionally organic grown produce vs controlled environment organic agriculture) very much.

Thanks Tinia!

Indoor Ag-Con Returns to Las Vegas to Discuss Farm Economics and New Technology Trends in Hydroponics, Aquaponics & Aeroponics

Indoor Ag-Con Returns to Las Vegas to Discuss Farm Economics and New Technology Trends in Hydroponics, Aquaponics & Aeroponics

Indoor Ag-Con – the indoor agriculture industry’s premier conference – will be returning to Las Vegas for the fifth year on May 3-4, 2017 to discuss the prospects for this increasingly important contributor to the global food supply chain.

LAS VEGAS, NV (PRWEB) MARCH 10, 2017

Indoor agriculture – growing crops using hydroponic, aquaponic and aeroponic techniques – has become popular as consumer demand for “local food” leads growers to add new farms in industrial and suburban areas across the country. Indoor Ag-Con – the industry’s premier conference – will be returning to Las Vegas for the fifth year on May 3-4, 2017 to discuss the prospects for this increasingly important contributor to the global food supply chain.

The two-day event will be held at the Las Vegas Convention Center, and is tailored toward corporate executives from the technology, investment, vertical farming, greenhouse growing, and food and beverage industries, along with hydroponic, aquaponic and aeroponic startups and urban farmers. It is unique in being crop-agnostic, covering crops from leafy greens and mushrooms to alternate proteins and legal cannabis. Participants will receive an exclusive hard copy of the newest edition in a popular white paper series, which is sponsored by Urban Crops and will focus on the US industry’s development.

The event will consist of keynotes from industry leaders and extended networking breaks, along with a 50+ booth exhibition hall. This already includes industry majors such as Certhon, Dosatron, DRAMM, Hort Americas, Philips Lighting, Priva, and Transcend Lighting. A new addition for 2017 is “lunch and learn” sessions covering practical topics such as health and safety. Confirmed speakers include executives from Argus Controls, Autogrow, Bright Agrotech, CropKing, Fresh Box Farms, Grobo, Intravision, Plenty, Priva, Shenandoah Farms and Village Farms among many others. “We’re expecting that the big themes for this year will be farm economics and the commercialization of newer technologies such as machine learning, and are excited to have gathered experts from across the world to speak. The entrepreneurs in our funding session have raised more than $50mn for their indoor farms in the past year alone, and one speaker is operating a 100k ft2 commercial controlled environment farm” commented Nicola Kerslake, founder of Newbean Capital, the event’s host.

Agriculture technology companies, suppliers and automation companies will have the chance to meet and mingle with leading vertical farmers and commercial greenhouse operators at a drinks party on the first evening of the event. Event sponsors include Autogrow, Urban Crops, Kennett Township, Freight Farms, Grodan, Joe Produce, Crop One Holdings and Grobo.

Beginning farmers, chefs and entrepreneurs can apply for passes to the event through the Nextbean program, which awards a limited number of complimentary passes to those who have been industry participants for less than two years. Applications are open through March 31, 2017 at Indoor Ag-Con’s website. The program is supported by Newbean Capital, the host of Indoor Ag-Con, and by Kennett Township, a leading indoor agriculture hub that produces half of the US’s mushrooms.

Indoor Ag-Con has also hosted events in Singapore, SG and New York, NY in the past year, and will host its first event in Dubai – in partnership with greenhouse major Pegasus Agriculture – in November 2017. Since it was founded in 2013, Indoor Ag-Con has captured an international audience and attracted some of the top names in the business. Events have welcomed nearly 2,000 participants from more than 20 countries.

Newbean Capital, the host of the conference, is a registered investment advisor; some of its clients or potential clients may participate in the conference. The Company is ably assisted in the event’s production by Rachelle Razon, Sarah Smith and Michael Nelson of Origin Event Planning, and by Michele Premone of Brede Allied.

5th Annual Indoor Ag-Con
Date – May 3-4, 2017
Place – South Hall, Las Vegas Convention Center, Las Vegas, NV
Exhibition Booths – available from $1,499 at indoor.ag
Registration – available from $399 at indoor.ag
Features – Two-day seminar, an exhibition hall, and after-party

For more information, please visit http://www.indoor.ag/lasvegas or call 775.623.7116

Students Give Schurz Food Science Lab a Green Thumbs Up

Students Give Schurz Food Science Lab a Green Thumbs Up

Erica Gunderson | March 9, 2017 4:46 pm

Hydroponics farms are hot in Chicago, with new farms sprouting up all over the city. But finding experienced hydroponics workers can be tough, so a local chef decided it was time for Chicago to grow its own. His program in a Northwest Side high school offers students the chance to get their hands dirty – and wet – growing greens in a working hydroponics farm.

We visited Carl Schurz High School, where the seeds are being planted for the next generation of urban farmers.

TRANSCRIPT

Brandis Friedman: It all starts with a seed.

Every few days, students in Schurz High School’s Food Science Lab spread thousands of tiny arugula seeds across damp paper towels and slip them under grow lights. After another few days, the sprouts become a crop of microgreens, which are delicately harvested and brought to the Schurz cafeteria to be mixed into lunchtime salads.

Jaime GuerreroJaime Guerrero, Schurz Food Science Lab: The students right now love the idea of having fresh basil in their salads.  They love the idea of microgreens because they add much flavor and diversity to what they’re already eating. And whether they realize it or not, they're adding so much nutrition to what their diets are, to what they eat in the cafeteria.

Friedman: Produce doesn’t get more local than that, and that’s exactly the way the Food Science Lab’s founder Jaime Guerrero likes it. The chef and marketing executive’s idea for a high school urban farming program started as a way to prove a restaurant concept.

Guerrero: The idea came from an urban farm restaurant concept that I had in my head. Through my alderman and other supporters in the community, Arts Alive, we came up with the idea of a proof of concept that would be within the area and we connected with Schurz high school.

Friedman: The farm began with two hydroponic grow towers in an old shop classroom. Guerrero recruited students to volunteer as his first farmers. Two years later, he says it’s the students who drive the program.

Guerrero: The input of the kids has been very essential.  The products that we have evolved here were a combination of things that work in these environments and with these systems and what we’ve tried, but also the tastes of these students. Our plans were to integrate it further into the departments and the school itself. This year we’re integrated into three departments: environmental science, botany and engineering.

Friedman: Yields from the Food Lab are often large enough to allow the program to donate herbs and microgreens to a nearby food pantry. And like any farm, increasing yields is a constant focus –whether it’s by adjusting light or fertilizer, testing different grow media or developing a prototype for a rotating growing system. For senior Nathaniel Dejesus, working in the Food Lab has allowed him to apply some of the problem-solving techniques he’s learned in his pre-engineering classes.

Nathaniel DejesusNathaniel Dejesus, Schurz senior: We thought of a triangle system that would have different layers. It would be a mist system, it would have LEDs under the trays, so you can access it easier. There'll be a pipe coming through the middle so it can all recycle back to the reservoir.

Friedman: Elsewhere in the lab, senior Veronica Burgo is growing tomato plants in the Food Computer, an agriculture technology platform developed by MIT to determine and share optimal growing conditions.

Veronica Burgo, Schurz senior: There were some astronauts that went out into space and took some tomato seeds and they were kind enough to let us use two packs of their seeds. We have four samples in here at the current moment, and we're trying to compare them against what we have in some of our other systems, like our lettuce systems to see if anything changed within the genetics of the plant.

Friedman: Veronica draws a direct line between her work in the Food Lab and her future career ambitions.

Veronica BurgoBurgo: I’m aspiring to be a biochemist and a lot of what we do here is chemistry and biology, so I would love to be a part of an urban farming group in college.

Friedman: For now, the Food Lab is being kept alive by donations and small grants, but funding continues to be a challenge. That’s why Guerrero hopes to fold other disciplines, like business management and marketing, into the curriculum so that Food Lab students can sell their product to the community and put the profits back into the program.

Guerrero: What we tell these kids every day is come in here, learn, experience what we have and at least be a little inspired to learn about it. If we get you to be interested to do something, to be a farmer, an engineer, even better. I think that this program can be great in this community as we build it up, but also anywhere in the country.

Meet Herbert, The Vertical Hydroponic Wall Garden

Meet Herbert, The Vertical Hydroponic Wall Garden

Derek Markham (@derekmarkham)

March 3, 2017

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© Ponix Systems

The latest edition of YAIGU (yet another indoor grow unit) brings you Herbert, an LED-powered indoor "farm" that grows greens & veggies on your wall.

There's nothing like fresh homegrown produce, but if you don't have an outdoor garden space, or you want a year-round supply of greens and veggies, you're gonna have to bring the 'farm' indoors. And the recent explosion of indoor grow unit products seems to suggest that there are a lot of people who are willing to do so, which might speak more to the desire for high-tech solutions than it does for the desire for local food (but which is probably a combination of the two).

The latest entry to the indoor growing gadget scene is Herbert, which is designed to be a space-saving solution, as it hangs on the wall, as well as a highly efficient one, as it incorporates both hydroponics (for fast growth) and LED lights (for energy-efficient illumination). While there's no indication of where the product's name comes from (Was Herbert a fantastic gardener? Is Herbert a strange portmanteau of herb + robot?), what's clear is that people dig the concept, as the Kickstarter campaign has already quadrupled its crowdfunding goal, with three weeks still to run.

At the core of Herbert is a hydroponic growing system, which grows the plants in a water-based solution (water plus nutrients) instead of soil, allowing for a smaller grow unit (plants need less space for growing medium) as well as more control over nutrient delivery, while also using 90% less water than soil-based systems. Driving the plants' growth is a 60W LED lighting unit, which is said to have been developed specifically for optimal growth, and between the hydroponic system and the lighting, Herbert is said to be "40% faster compared to traditional farming methods."

"Plants use sunlight to convert CO₂ into sugar and other organic compounds. With our lighting solutions you are not only not dependant on daylight anymore and require less thereof, with Malina, our adaptive LED, it is possible to change the light spectrum to meet the specific requirements of plants and their different growth stages. Taste, yield, resilience towards pest problems, surface feel, and growth - all these factors can be influenced by using an optimal lighting system!" - Ponix Systems

15 plants can fit into Herbert, ranging from salad greens to herbs to strawberries, and the initial purchase includes 30 biodegradable sponges (which are used instead of a pot with soil), as well as starter set of seeds and fertilizer. And seeing as it's 2017, a subscription model will have new seeds, sponges, and fertilizer shipped direct to your door if desired.

The units measure 32.3 x 22.0 x 4.5 inches (820 x 560 x 115 mm) and weigh 26.5 lb (12 kg) when fully loaded with plants and water. And BECAUSE APPS, Herbert also integrates with an iOS or Android application that can be used to adjust the lighting settings, as well as "guide you through the growing process."

Here's the kicker, though, which may be a deal-killer for some: Herbert costs almost $400 for backers of the campaign, which is said to be 25% off the future retail price. That's a lot of green for growing green on your wall, but it could be an even trade-off for those who value homegrown produce. The other potential downside to Herbert is the grow light, which is essential to its operation, but which could also be too much light for people in some rooms of the house (your mileage may vary, but I've got an LED grow light that's about double the wattage, and it's intensely bright).

Find out more about this vertical hydro unit at the Herbert Kickstarter page or at Ponix Systems.

There Are Acres of Leafy Greens Inside These Shipping Crates On An Old St. Petersburg Junkyard

There Are Acres of Leafy Greens Inside These Shipping Crates On An Old St. Petersburg Junkyard

• Laura Reiley, Times Food Critic

Friday, February 17, 2017 10:48am

ST. PETERSBURG — The would-be farmers bought three transoceanic refrigerated shipping containers, just a little dinged up, for $6,500 each.

Shannon O'Malley and Bradley Doyle had them hauled to a distressed property they purchased on Second Avenue S and painted them a vibrant green. The green of John Deere tractors and regimented rows of farm crops.

Because this is what they were building: A farm. Brick Street Farms.

The property had been used as a junk yard and asphalt dump for years. They hauled 57 loads of trash away on a 50-yard dump truck. It took eight months to clean and level the property before they could bring in their three slightly used shipping containers, two rows of picnic tables and a tall fence to discourage the lookie-loos.

You can't blame the loos for looking. This is Pinellas County's first and only commercial-size, indoor, hydroponic farm. These three upcycled containers have the ability to grow the equivalent of 6 acres of traditionally farmed leafy greens, herbs and edible flowers, using a minimum of water and no pesticides, herbicides or fungicides.

There is no dirt, there are no bugs and produce is delivered "plate ready" to the Vinoy, Brick & Mortar, Rococo Steak, Souzou, Stillwaters Tavern and BellaBrava, all in St. Petersburg. O'Malley aims to sell everything she produces within five miles of Brick Street Farms.

In this era of locavore fever, you can't get much more local than that.

Indoor, hydroponic, vertical farms are popping up in urban spaces around the globe. A dwindling amount of arable land due to industrialization, urban sprawl and climate pressures, coupled with population growth (9 billion people predicted on Earth by 2050!), has led many people to think creatively about our food supply.

Farmer Dave Smiles launched a 24,000-square-foot warehouse in Tampa in 2015 doing similar indoor vertical farming. In the same year in Newark, New Jersey a steel-supply company was taken over by a new indoor-agriculture company called AeroFarms, filling it with 70,000-square-feet of vertical kale, bok choi, watercress and such. In January, the New Yorker ran an exuberant article about the future of urban farming without soil or natural light.

But it's not easy: The nation's largest indoor farm, FarmedHere, which opened in 2013 in an abandoned warehouse in Bedford Park, Ill., closed its 90,000-square-foot facility in January. While CEO Nate Laurell didn't say precisely what had gone awry, it is clear that growing large enough to offset equipment, energy and labor costs proved tricky.

There are, O'Malley says, considerable costs to running the operation, but she declined to say what the farm's ongoing costs are.

"Hydroponics aren't new, this technology isn't new and all the technology we used is 'off the shelf,'" said O'Malley, 35, who recently quit her job at Duke Energy to work the farm full time. Doyle, 37, still works in information technology at Duke Energy.

Here's how it works. Each container is its own climate, kale in the one on the right, herbs in the middle one and heirloom lettuces on the left. There are three inches of insulation, plus reflective roofing to keep things cool, plus air conditioning (lettuces like it chilly, around 60 degrees). Everything is grown from non-GMO heirloom seeds, spending two weeks in the seedling area before each tiny root plug is transplanted to a white vertical tower, fitted into a mesh of recycled food-safe plastic.

The plant lives in the tower for three to five weeks, with recirculated water running down a felt wicking strip to feed the plants.

Strips of red and blue Phillips high-efficiency LED lights provide the sunshine (although because electricity is cheaper at night, the plants "daytime" is in the evening. From there, it gets complicated. Computers take readings of the plants every seven minutes — pH levels get adjusted, CO2 levels are tweaked, plant nutrients are measured in electrical conductivity and there's special air circulation for proper "plant transpiration."

According to O'Malley, this kind of indoor vertical farming uses one tenth the water of traditional farming and a tenth of the fuel (a traditional farm uses fuel to run the equipment and deliver product, for an indoor farm fuel costs are all electricity).

So how does all this high-tech food taste?

Glorious. Basil leaves as big as a catcher's mitt (well, a kid's mitt), rainbow chard and lacinato kale. Pea shoots and micro kohlrabi, arugula and red amaranth. The Vinoy is using a special mix of Brick Street lettuces in their salads and Rococo Steak will host a farm-to-table dinner at the farm on Feb. 25.

"It's a much more consistent product and a much cleaner product because it's not grown in dirt," says Jeffrey Jew, the executive chef at Stillwaters Tavern and BellaBrava. "It's super cool what they're doing. I know at the beginning Shannon was looking for chefs and restaurants to sell to. But now they're pretty much maxed out."

It's true. O'Malley and Doyle are looking to buy more containers, their goal seven across and stacked two deep. They don't envision doing a community supported agriculture subscription in which consumers buy a share of a farm, a popular model for more traditional farms. But they do sell direct to the public on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and Saturday afternoons.

They spend a lot of their time explaining what they're doing. No, they're not growing cannabis. No, it's not U-pick. No, it's not open to the public. And it's not a garden. It's not a laboratory.

It's a farm. You just have to think inside the box.

Contact Laura Reiley at lreiley@tampabay.com or (727) 892-2293. Follow @lreiley. 

Why We Need Technology As The Key Ingredient In Our Food

Peter Diamandis, ContributorChairman XPRIZE

Why We Need Technology As The Key Ingredient In Our Food

02/17/2017 01:54 pm ET | Updated 15 hours ago

hen asked how food security and production can be improved in Africa, former Rwandan minister and current president of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) Agnes Kaliba, had one simple answer: “Access to technologies.”

Ms. Kaliba is exactly right. We are sitting at the cusp of an explosion in exponential technologies, which can be the most critically important ingredients to improve the health and quality of life for all humanity.

The World Food Programme (WFP), the largest humanitarian organization in the world, estimates that some 795 million people do not have enough to eat to maintain their health. Additionally, we have faced an unprecedented number of large-scale emergencies — Syria, Iraq and the El Niño weather phenomenon in Southern Africa. Just last month, WFP stepped up support for tens of thousands of displaced Syrians returning home to the ruins of eastern Aleppo City, providing hot meals, ready-to-eat canned food and staple food items such as rice, beans, vegetable oil and lentils. Like Agnes Kaliba in Nairobi, WFP has resolved that technology will help most rapidly in providing better assistance in emergencies and achieve a world without hunger.

Singularity University (SU), which I co-founded with Ray Kurzweil in 2008, is a benefit organization focused on using exponential technologies to solve our Global Grand Challenges. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Ertharin Cousin, the Executive Director of WFP, announced a new partnership with SU for a Global Impact Challenge for food.

Our Challenge is soliciting bold ideas from innovators around the world on how to create a sustainable supply of food after the onset of a crisis. In this way, we can help vulnerable families support their own households and reduce their dependence on external assistance. Entries can range from concepts to implemented innovations. Shortlisted winners will be invited to a bootcamp at the WFP Innovation Accelerator in Munich to flesh out their ideas with WFP innovators. One team will be selected to attend an all-expenses-paid, nine-week Global Solutions Program at Singularity University at NASA Research Park in Silicon Valley.

Here are some examples of moonshot thinking – and how converging exponential technologies are already reinventing food:

• Vertical Farming: If 80% of our planet’s arable land is already in use, then let’s look up. The impact of technology in vertical farming is powerful. In addition to maximizing the use of land, we can use AI to control the exact frequency and duration of light and pH and nutrient levels of the water supply. Vertical farms using clean-room technologies avoid pesticides and herbicides, and the fossil fuels used for plowing, fertilizing, harvesting and food delivery. Vertical farms are immune to weather, with crops grown year-round. One acre of a vertical farm can produce 10x to 20x that of a traditional farm. And if roughly one-quarter of world’s food calories are lost or wasted in transportation, then let’s think local. The average American meal travels 1,500 miles before being consumed. Moreover, 70 percent of a food’s final retail price is the cost of transportation, storage and handling. These miles add up quickly. The vertical farming market was $1.1 billion in 2015, and projected to exceed $6 billion by 2022.

• Hydroponics and Aeroponics: Traditional agriculture uses 70 percent of the water on this planet. Hydroponics is 70 percent more efficient than traditional agriculture, and aeroponics is 70 percent more efficient than hydroponics. In times of war and natural disaster, there are no readily available food sources, so let’s think creatively on how we can grow food from — and in — the air.

• Bioprinting Meat: In 2016, it took 63 billion land animals to feed 7 billion humans. It’s a HUGE business. Land animals occupy one-third of the non-ice landmass, use 8% of our water supply and generate 18% of all greenhouse gases — more than all the cars in the world. Work is progressing on bioprinting (tissue engineering and 3D printing) to grow meat (beef, chicken and pork) and leathers in a lab. By bio-printing meat, we would be able to feed the world with 99% less land, 96% less water, 96% fewer greenhouse gases and 45% less energy.

• Shifting diets: Optimal health requires 10-20 percent of calories to come from protein. One example of innovative thinking comes from Africa, where farmers are installing fish ponds in home gardens, as the mud from the bottom of the pond also makes a great mineral-rich fertilizer. In the lab, scientists are investigating new biocrops.

This is just the beginning. If we are really serious about creating a vibrant ecosystem of sustainable food production, we need to be thinking exponentially and using technology to help create cost-efficient innovative solutions that can feed the world.

The Aquaculture Industry, Other Than For Shellfish, Is Completely Dependent On The Animal Feed Industry That Sustains It

Grass Fed Fish

The Aquaculture Industry, Other Than For Shellfish, Is Completely Dependent On The Animal Feed Industry That Sustains It.

By John Reid*

This sounds almost silly to say because it is so obvious, but few fully understand where their feed comes from, and the changes that are accelerating amongst all animal feeds as well as for aquaculture diets. This is kind of like the old adage that most people think that “food comes from the supermarket”, forgetting about the role of farms that produce our food. With aquaculture, many people forget that (excluding fish meal) the source of all of our aquaculture feeds is not from our feed suppliers, but our farms, and in particular our soil, water resources, and climate.

There are four key global trends that are colliding to create a great opportunity and challenge for animal protein production and especially the aquaculture industry. The success of surmounting these will depend entirely on our feed sources. These four are: the growing global demand for more meat protein, skyrocketing population growth, soil erosion, and climate change factors like declining water availability, rising temperatures, and ocean acidification.

Immediately you may be beginning to think this is an article about some doomsday scenario; it is not, but only because I will be so bold as to say, because we will have addressed a major shift in the kinds of fish we grow and the feeds we feed them. This article is not necessarily a unique description of our challenges, but possibly a unique solution.

Macro Environment Challenges

The world’s population now stands above seven billion people and all estimates have it growing to about ten and a half billion by 2050. This is a growth increase of 35% or 1.5 million new people per week. We are adding (and need to feed) the equivalent of one additional New York City metropolitan area every two months!

A 35% growth in population means we need to increase the global food supply by at least 35%. This in itself is a daunting challenge to accomplish, but due to changing eating preferences towards higher meat consumption, it is expected that world food production will need to increase by nearly 100%. This is due to the additional feed needed to produce an increasing percent of animal protein.

In the next 35 years this 35% to 100% increase in food production needs to be created in as much as 30% less land than is available for today’s population. This is due to declining soil fertility, and soil erosion. In the US, an area the size of the state of Rhode Island is lost every year to soil erosion. Between 1840 and 1917 when the first soil surveys of the US were done, there was over eight feet of topsoil depth (or tilth) across the US. The average today is approximately eight inches. By some estimates soil loss in the US is greater now than it was during the ‘dust-bowl’ days of the 1930’s. (We have consumed our fossil soils in similar ways as our fossil fuels). The US has lost nearly 87% of its topsoil resources since the mid 1800’s. The loss of topsoil costs the US USD$36 billion every year in productivity losses.

Around the world soil is being lost 10 to 40 times faster than it is being replenished. Worldwide, cropland is shrinking by more than 10 million ha a year due to soil erosion (about the size of the state of Indiana every year). This implies that farming techniques used today are not sustainable, and production on much of the US and global soils needs to be changed to less soil intensive techniques. Next to (and irrespective of) Global Warming, soil loss is considered the greatest challenge to sustaining US and global food supplies. It is questionable that soils of US and the world can maintain their current output let alone sustain the massive increase in agriculture that will be needed to sustain population growth.

Compounding the dearth of soil tilth is diminishing water availability. Even if more land were pressed into agricultural production (at great cost to forests and biodiversity), there is not the water needed to support additional cultivation using existing practices. Some 70% of the planet is covered by water, but only 2% is fresh water, and of that 2%, 1.6% is (currently) contained in frozen ice caps, leaving only .4% available for the existing population of 7 Billion people. By 2025, the World Bank predicts that 66% of the world will run short of fresh drinking water and 80% of the world will be fresh water limited by 2050.

The water shortages for agriculture will be immense. Meeting crop demands in the next ten years, for 2025, when the world´s population will be ‘just’ 8 billion, will require a new volume of water equivalent to the entire flow of the Nile river, times ten! There just simply will not be enough water to increase current agricultural output by 100% using current practices. There may not even be enough to supply the base of 35% needed to feed the world as we do today.

Multiplying the negative impacts on food production, beyond the trends of soil loss and water shortages, are the effects of climate change or global warming. There are many impacts of global warming on agriculture that are too numerous to note here, but probably the largest will be the impact of excessive heat. With many crops already growing near their maximum heat tolerance, most crop yields will fall with any further rise in temperatures. Corn fails to form seed heads when average growing temperatures are above 95°F and soybean above 102°F. Crop yields are predicted to fall by much as 10% in the US and as much as 50% in Pakistan, or about a 30% global reduction in output due just to heat, not counting lost soil or limited water resources. There are many compounding factors like ethanol production but heat is one of the key factors for price spikes and long term increase in grain prices.

The impact of global warming on food supplies does not stop on land, but continues deep into the oceans. Not counting aquaculture, currently 16% to 20% of the world’s protein comes from ocean fisheries. Including the 5% of the world’s protein produced from fisheries products that are fed to animals, the oceans’ percent of global protein production is near 25%. Given that it takes 2 to 15 pounds of grain or fodder to grow a pound of protein on land, the 16% to 25% of global protein that comes from the oceans is reducing the load that terrestrial agriculture needs to produce protein by as much as 50% (assuming a good food conversion ratio or FCR of 2). Ocean yields in many areas are falling due to overfishing, but global warming will exacerbate declining ocean harvests. Even if ocean harvests remain constant, the 100% new food production needed will not have the ~25% subsidy that is currently provided by the oceans. This means we are likely faced with producing as much as 150% more food to maintain expected market preferences.       

Marine or ocean-based aquaculture cannot be counted as a true increase in ocean yields because it relies from 50% to 90% on terrestrially produced feeds. Aquaculture can create protein more efficiently but is not a true substitute for lost ocean harvests because even ocean aquaculture is dependent on land based soil and water resources to grow feed. Feeding terrestrial-based feeds to an ocean environment is also a form of soil erosion, a concept discussed more below.

Like the terrestrial impacts of global warming, impacts on fisheries yield are also too numerous to note here. Currently the largest impact is projected to come from changes in the pH of seawater, or ocean acidification. The dissolving of CO2 into seawater, forming carbonic acid, causes ocean acidification. Predictions on the decline in ocean fisheries yield due to ocean acidification are still preliminary but range from 10% to a 50% drop in all ocean yields by the end of this century. Calcium based shelled animals, like shrimp, crabs and mollusks are the most at risk. They represent 21% of all ocean harvests and their loss could be from 30% to a complete collapse of all production. In 2008, shellfish aquaculture producers in the US Pacific Northwest experienced an 80% drop in shellfish stocks due to drops in ocean pH. Regional stocks have since recovered to 70% of their previous total, but this one event is indicative of how sensitive ocean species are to pH changes. Based on the decline of calcareous algae, which are one of the key supports of the entire marine food system, many fish species may also be at risk.

The net impact of current trends of population growth, soil loss, water shortages, temperature rise, and ocean acidification, (and other factors not noted here) add up to a very challenging time to sustain existing production let alone provide the minimum need of 35% to 150% more food for the world.

The US food system is not likely to collapse but the price pressures put on US supply due to domestic and international demand for exports of protein and grain stock will push US food and especially US protein prices to rise much higher than the normal rates experienced over the last 50 years. This is a large opportunity for aquaculture markets to provide a competitive protein source but a huge challenge regarding the food supplies for aquaculture.

Grains As Our Food Base

The sustainability of aquaculture feed sources is directly related to the sustainability and to the very viability of the aquaculture industry itself. There has been a lot of attention paid to replacing fishmeal in diets given the well-discussed limitations of fishmeal supply, overfishing of fishmeal, as well as price limitations. Concurrent with reductions in use, or a complete shift away from fishmeal, have been innovations in other protein boosters, like insect diets, algae and other protein sources. But these are all added to a base of grains. Even though we are still developing effective all-grain diets, grains have become the backbone of the aquaculture industry, just like they are for Chicken, Pork and Beef.

However as noted above, it is highly likely that grains cannot carry the load of increased production in a sustainable way. Grains are delicious on their own, and provide a cornucopia of other uses, but they simply cannot be looked at as the base that will continue to supply the animal feed industry sustainably.

If soil tilth alone is used as an indication of sustainability we have been “deficit-spending”, draining the bank account of our soil tilth for a long time. Some could argue this goes back to the reasons humans migrated out of Mesopotamia to northern Europe, but that is another article. If one really does the math, the “global stoichiometry,” it simply does not add up to depend on grains for the long-term future of protein production or aquaculture’s food supply. I will be so bold again as to say: it is an inevitability that we must reduce our dependence on grains for all animal feeds, or reduce our dependence on animal protein.

Grass Based Feeds

Rather than everyone going on vegetarian diets, one proposed solution that would work could be grass-based feeds. Everything about grass production is nearly the opposite of grain production. Grasses use a fraction of the water and fertilizer of grains, are more heat-tolerant than grains, have equivalent, sometimes larger biomass yields and many types are high protein. Because grasses are mowed, and not tilled, they protect and grow soil tilth, not consume it. Grasses can be pelleted and processed in similar ways as grains, with many similar mineral and vitamin mixes added. But most importantly, grasses produced in sustainable ways, sequester carbon in huge quantities.

Some claim that a large percentage of carbon emissions causing global warming has come from our lost soils. Not just burning of oil, but soil volatizing back to gaseous carbon that was once sequestered in our deep soils. Even more dramatic is the possibility that converting a large portion of our grain base to grass could recapture this carbon and reduce annual carbon emissions by 25% or more. This is a large controversial topic, but some have powerful and well-grounded arguments that this could be a larger factor in slowing climate change than all the wind, solar or even nuclear production installed to date.

All current terrestrial species could grow well on grass-based diets since most evolved to eat grasses in the first place. Aquaculture has the ability to take the best advantage of grass diets, due to overall lower food conversion ratios, the fact that many fish species are efficient low protein consumers, and other well-known factors.

So how do grass based feeds get the world more production, not just the same equivalent yields in a more sustainable way? A large percentage of grass production will need to replace grain fields, and this is not likely to create any net-new production, but it helps reduce soil erosion and the yield killing impacts of global warming. Gains come when grasses are produced on lands that are now currently too poor to grow grains, land set-asides for soil-conservation purposes become moot, and a net increase in cultivable area is realized. The 60% to 70% lower water requirements of grasses can allow irrigated areas to double or triple their effective acreage. When greater net yields are combined with the greater efficiencies of aquaculture achieving the 35% increase in food production seems likely, and gives us a strong shot at supplying the expanding market for higher protein foods such as fish.

Grasses Are Not A Panacea (Yet)

As with any new approach to production, grass-based feeds need to undergo a lot of development to be commercially viable on the mass-scale that is needed. The first challenge is that commonly grown grasses are not as energy dense, nor protein rich as most grains. This author has worked with diets that were effectively 40% grasses, and 60% grains to boost protein to a minimal level of 28% that was fed to tilapia. Growth was about 90% that of the 32% protein diets used as a control. A good start but not a viable solution for most tilapia growers, and certainly not for other species requiring higher protein diets. Real progress will be made when the ratio can be flipped to 70% grass and just 30% grains or other additives, with equivalent or better growth rates.

This initial formula was based primarily on substituting alfalfa, since that was all that was commercially available at the time. But there are literally thousands of different types of grasses to work with. When these are combined with the new protein boosting compounds coming on the market, based on insects, a wide range of digestive enzymes, and a host of others, perfecting high protein diets in the 35% range seems very likely.

The other side of the coin to raising the protein level of feeds is lowering the protein requirements of fish. Chickens do very well on a 20% protein diet, and this is one reason they dominate the market as a low-cost protein. High chicken growth on low protein feed was not luck, this represents as much as 100 years of development from early modern chicken breeds like the Rhode Island Red to Arbor Acer’s (Avigen’s) breeding stock. Tilapia, grass carp and many others are good aquaculture options, but they are nearly wild-stock species. The genetic potential for fish species is so much greater than poultry, given their lower overhead as cold-blooded animals and many other reasons. We are just scratching the surface at breeding better strains of the existing species we have, or developing new low-protein eating species.

One other challenge for grass-based diets that must be considered is the recycling of aquaculture wastes back to farmland. The soil-regenerative capacity of grasses is large, but if the manure of aquaculture is thrown into rivers, or the ocean, it is a form of soil erosion. Manure is still the biomass of the soil and too much loss can out-strip the soil growth rate, and we are back again at the negative soil production rates we have currently. Applying aquaculture manure to farmland, to a substantial degree will preclude the use of saltwater production. Not to be a ‘soil-fascist’, there is of course some room to feed marine species with terrestrially sourced diets, but it must be kept at a minimum because saltwater manure cannot be applied to terrestrial fields. This places interesting constraints on the kind of aquaculture systems that can be used. Of course RAS comes to mind, but the use of irrigation reservoirs as ponds, or culture cages in large reservoirs where the manure wastes can be cycled back to farmland, also become preferable methods of production.

A large advantage of grass-based feeds as a whole production program combining diets, genetics and production systems, is it is likely to be much more profitable than current aquaculture techniques. All the attributes that make grass-based feeds sustainable, also make it a less expensive production system. The opportunity exists to lower costs sufficiently to rival chicken as the low cost protein in the world, and the massive sales volumes that would come with that.

A Long-Term Program That Must Be Developed Quickly

Given all of the social and environmental issues noted here that are literally growing exponentially, there is a lot to do. To develop grass based feeds, a multidisciplinary approach is needed between farmers, feed mills, additive producers, livestock and aquaculture producers, and universities as well as governments to modify some laws, provide research funding and create some initial market incentives.

Options other than grass-diets may evolve, but whatever they are they will have to meet the basic tenants discussed here. I will be bold again to say that if these are not met, we will not be able to avoid huge calamities in food production, and all the societal issues that can spin out of food shortages. We categorically cannot continue as we are now for much more than 20 to a maximum of 30 years.

The good news is we have solutions. They will involve a large investment, but can generate huge opportunities. The opportunity is to generate a new low cost protein that can feed the world, upgrade protein levels for many, be sustainable, and possibly stop or even reverse global warming. Now this is a recipe worth pursuing. There was a Green Revolution, and a Blue Revolution – but this is the Teal Revolution, blending fish and fields, Green and Blue for Grass Fed Fish!

*John Reid Is the CEO of Waterfield Farms, Inc. He has over thirty years of experience in the design, finance and operations of food and energy companies. He has built and run multiple aquaculture and hydroponic systems as well as worked with co-generation and bio-fuels around the world.