UA Magazine no. 34 – Measuring Impact

UA Magazine no. 34 – Measuring Impact

Linked by Michael Levenston

Assessment of the urban or city region food system is an important basis for improved and evidence-based policy-making and planning for more sustainable and resilient food systems.

RUAF
May 2018

In the past year, we have seen the development of various assessment and indicator frameworks to help cities to map the current status and performance of their city region food system. With this magazine, we like to explore how such assessment frameworks have concretely supported planning and policy, and have enabled cities to measure and monitor changes in relation to food strategies and action plans.

Opinion UA Magazine
Editorial UA Magazine

Assessing City Region Food Systems

City Region Food System Assessment and Planning
The NADHALI Approach for Assessing and Planning City-driven Food Systems: When rapidity meets complex realities
Involving Citizen Experts in Sustainability Assessment of the City Region Food System
Improving Urban Nutrition in Africa and Asia Through Policy Change

Assessing Food System Resilience

Building Resilient Food Systems for Urban Food Security. Examples from Baltimore City, Maryland
Assessing the Capacity and Resilience of Melbourne’s Foodbowl: The Foodprint Melbourne project
Assessing the Impact of Climate Change and Extreme Weather Events on the Food System in the City of Toronto
The Inclusion of Food in Quito’s Resilience Strategy
Vulnerability and Resilience of the Colombo Urban Food System to Extreme Weather
Resilience of Urban Food Supply in West Africa

Food System Data and Indicators

A City Region Food System Indicator Framework – A new resource for cities
New York City Food Indicators: Sharing lessons for the next decade
Good Scholarship on Urban Agriculture and Food Systems
Measuring Progress in Sustainable Food Cities: A Toolbox for Action
How Ede Municipality Developed a Tool to Monitor Improvement of the Local Food System
Communicating Goals and Impacts of Urban Food Sharing
Measuring Urban Agriculture for Sound Policy in a North American City
Resources UA Magazine 34
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Read the complete magazine here.

Starbucks Offers “Grounds For Your Garden” From Local United Kingdom Stores

Starbucks Offers “Grounds For Your Garden” From Local Stores

Posted on 24 May 2018 by Ben Wood

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Starbucks has joined forces with The Allotments & Gardens Council UK to offer green-fingered gardeners the chance to pick up coffee grounds from their local store to use on their plants, as the grounds can help boost plant growth.

The “Grounds For Your Garden” scheme sees Starbucks stores across the UK donating bags of used coffee to customers, encouraging gardeners to use coffee waste as a natural fertilizer and help boost crop growth, in collaboration with The Allotments & Gardens Council UK, which is helping promote the idea to its members.

According to the Allotments & Gardens Council UK, coffee grounds provide a great long-term way to enrich the soil and eliminate the need for other fertilizers, and they can also speed up the composting process – making them the perfect natural material to use in private gardens, allotments, and outdoor spaces.

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The “Grounds For Your Garden” scheme is seen as an ideal way to reuse waste, as even the packaging is reused; baristas scoop used coffee grounds into the empty bags originally used to deliver espresso beans to stores. All customers need to do to get involved in the scheme is to pick up a free bag of used coffee grounds, which will be located by the check out in their local Starbucks store, or they can ask their barista.

Jeff Bond, a board member for The Allotments and Gardens and Council UK, commented: “Our members are always looking for new ways to boost their crop growth and this scheme really benefits gardeners in local communities who may not have access to this natural fertilizer. Used coffee grounds are high in nitrogen so they are fantastic for plant growth and we can use them for growing a range of plants on the allotments from, tomatoes to marrows and even pumpkins!”

Clare Walker, communications director for Starbucks UK, said: “Thank you to the Allotments and Gardens Council UK for shining a spotlight on this programme, which we have offered in our stores for 20 years. We’re committed to reducing waste from our stores, and it’s a great opportunity to support local gardeners and allotment keepers too!”

Water of Plenty: Meet The Trio Practicing Soilless Farming in Delhi

Water of Plenty: Meet The Trio Practicing Soilless Farming in Delhi

Triton Foodworks aims to change the face of urban farming through hydroponics

BY SAYAN CHAKRABORTY Forbes India Staff

May 28, 2018

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Two of Triton Foodworks’ five co-founders quit after a brush with Delhi’s municipal authorities, but Deepak Kukreja (sitting), Ullas Samrat (left) and Dhruv Khanna (right) decided to stay put
Image: Madhu Kapparath

When Ullas Samrat and Dhruv Khanna spoke after a long hiatus in the summer of 2014, they had a lot to share. The childhood friends had drifted apart when Khanna relocated to Singapore for a master’s degree in 2013, while Samrat stayed back in Delhi to work in his family’s lighting business.

On that call, they mostly spoke about where their lives were headed. Samrat was figuring out a way to keep his mother, who suffered from a lung disorder, away from Delhi’s air pollution. His plan to shift his mother to a farmhouse on the outskirts was struck down by doctors—pesticides, soil and dust at the farms would do her no good. This got him thinking about farming without soil. Khanna, stationed in Singapore, was building his own startup, one that aspired to make TVs smart.

A few minutes into the conversation, both figured they wanted to do something more “meaningful and impactful in life”. Working on a sustainable farming module could be a good starting point, the friends agreed.

“When I told Dhruv about soilless farming, he called me back in three days and said there are a few startups in Singapore [like Comcrop] doing the same. Dhruv said he would be visiting India in a couple of months and if we could figure out a pilot by then, he could work on his startup from Delhi and relocate,” says Samrat, 28, in a phone interview.

Khanna, also 28, did return in September. By then, the duo had sold their dream to three others—Devanshu Shivnani, Deepak Kukreja and Vaibhav Batra. In October they set up Triton Foodworks and started out by growing strawberries hydroponically—without the use of soil, in a nutrient-rich medium using water as a solvent—on a plot in Delhi’s Sainik Farms, where Samrat’s family owned some land. The yield was heartening—eight tonnes, which fetched them a profit of about ₹3.5 lakh.

The five founders, all in their twenties, were elated as the dream to create something impactful had started to take wing. Hydroponics was the way forward for sustainable agriculture, they concluded. First, hydroponics requires 60-80 percent less water than conventional farming. Second, one can practise high-density cultivation with hydroponics. Third, since there is no soil involved, there is no scope of lacerating the soil with pesticides and other chemicals. 

Explains Kukreja, 39, “In soil cultivation, plant spacing has to be maintained because the plants compete for minerals, but here, since we feed the plants with precision, it gives us the scope to increase plant density. We can also grow vertically for small and compact plants like strawberries, lettuces and herbs.” 

He adds, “In conventional farming, we have to do crop rotation to avoid soil erosion and avoid problems like nematodes and pests, but hydroponics gives us the advantage to cultivate a certain crop throughout the year.”

In hydroponics, since there is no soil involved, the farmer is free to cultivate the same crop repeatedly

However, the company’s wings were soon clipped by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, which razed a greenhouse structure they were starting to put up. “In Sainik Farms, construction of new houses and digging borewells for residential use is not permitted due to an ongoing case, but there is no restriction for agricultural activities,” says Khanna, adding that they were asked for bribes.

“When we refused, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi demolished the greenhouse without giving any notice. When we complained to the local MLA, a few days later a junior engineer from MCD came to apologise and told us he thought we were building a house.”

The team was shaken to the core, the immediate fallout of the corporation’s action being Batra’s exit. Next, Shivnani chose to take a break and pursue an MBA. Meanwhile, an institutional investor who had evinced interest in the firm also withheld investment. The flight, in effect, was grounded even before it could take off.

“More money had to be pumped in and we were all very tense. Everyone had this awkward conversation at home where we asked for more money and our parents were not convinced this time. They had already given us money to kick-start the operations,” recalls Samrat of the tumultuous days.

However, Samrat, Kukreja and Khanna decided to stay put. The plan was to take up hydroponics consultancy work for about a year or two, make enough revenue and plough it back into their firm to continue with R&D—the firm had set up two research and production facilities in Rohini in Delhi and Wada near Mumbai. Between January 2016 and mid-2017, the company executed about five projects in Delhi, Karnataka, and Maharashtra —which fetched them about ₹1 crore in revenue—simultaneously working on the research facilities.

The idea was to develop indigenous hydroponics techniques as well as reduce the cost of operations, which could skyrocket to about ₹2 crore for an acre of land. By the end of 2017, Triton Foodworks had devised a way to reduce the cost of setting up a greenhouse hydroponics unit to about ₹1.25 crore.

“The idea was to source as much raw material as possible from local vendors, design the systems ourselves and get them made by local manufacturers,” says Khanna. Adds Kukreja of some of their innovations, “Instead of plastic moulds to hold the crops, which cost about ₹25 lakh for an acre, we use styrofoam, which is not only cheaper but also keeps the temperature low. The cost comes down to ₹15 lakh.” The team has also developed a high-pressure fogger, which sprays smaller water droplets compared to conventional fogging systems. 

Late last year, the company stopped consultancy work and turned its attention to developing their own farms. To consolidate operations, it shut down their research facilities and took up a five-acre plot in Manesar, where it grows different varieties of tomato, strawberries, lettuce, eggplants, and pepper among other plants. The plan is to stock the produce in retail outlets in Delhi under the ChopChop brand as well as sell directly to hotels and restaurants. The current fiscal is expected to fetch the firm ₹1 crore in revenue.

“There has been a lot of exposure around food and food experimentation has become big in urban markets. Also, the eating out market has grown and exposed a lot of urban centres to new tastes and ingredients, which have found their way into people’s kitchens. Hence, this category is finding significant retail shelf in outlets, which makes startups in this space interesting,” says Ankur Bisen, senior vice-president at retail consultancy firm Technopak Advisors.

The greenfield opportunity in hydroponics has also attracted businesses such as Letcetra Agritech, BitMantis Innovations, Junga FreshnGreen and Future Farms. 

The trio of Triton is in no mood to let go of the opportunity.

Q & A With Frank Sharp, Senior Technical Leader, The Electric Power Research Institute, Inc.

Q & A With Frank Sharp, Senior Technical Leader, The Electric Power Research Institute, Inc.

 Background on EPRI:

The Electric Power Research Institute, Inc. (EPRI, www.epri.com) conducts research and development relating to the generation, delivery and use of electricity for the benefit of the public.

An independent, nonprofit organization, EPRI brings together its scientists and engineers as well as experts from academia and industry to help address challenges in electricity, including reliability, efficiency, health, safety and the environment. EPRI's members represent more than 90 percent of the electricity generated and delivered in the United States, and international participation extends to 40 countries. EPRI's principal offices and laboratories are located in Palo Alto, Calif.; Charlotte, N.C.; Knoxville, Tenn.; and Lenox, Mass.

Q&A: Frank Sharp, Senior Technical Leader, Energy Utilization, EPRI. 

• What is the best form factor in this industry?  
•  
  • EPRI is researching CEA because of its potential to address issues related to population growth, food security, food safety, water access, water use, sustainability, grid load, local job creation, land usage, and smart city integration, all for community benefit. 
  •  
• • That said, we see three primary emerging forms and each have benefits:
    • The converted warehouse, vertical farm, custom building
    •  
      • This provides opportunity to use underutilized or underperforming real estate in areas that often have limited economic potential. 
      •  
      • These facilities offer the ability to yield high quality produce in large volumes near population centers via their use of technologies to maintain ideal growing conditions. 
      •  
    • Converted shipping containers or pods
      • This approach is highly mobile, is often modular, and utilize modern technologies to maintain growing conditions.
      •  
      • These facilities offer the ability to reliability deliver fresh produce to targeted communities and applications and use minimal resources 
      •  
    • Augmented greenhouses where heat and lighting are added to keep the greenhouse operating year-round. 
    •  
      • This format has lower operational cost per square foot since it’s lighting load is only utilized when sunlight is not available 
      •  
  • These facilities have the ability to deliver crops in large scale and deliver fresh produce year-round to markets. We found a lot of unanswered questions about each of these types of controlled environment agriculture and they all warrant significantly more research as we move forward. We are working with utilities and CEA groups to better leverage current technology to forward each of these formats for the public benefit. 
  •  
• • In addition to these three forms there are other forms developing like aquaculture, indoor shrimp production, and insects for protein.
  •  
  • Note, established industries like traditional greenhouses and floriculture operations are also very common and will continue to expand and be utilized. These operations are typically not researched by EPRI since their operations and technologies are well established. EPRI does follow work in these areas and will engage to evaluate new process and technologies in these operations if they emerge.  
  •  
• With major e coli and other pathogen outbreak concerns plaguing the food landscape, CEA is a viable solution if implemented correctly. What measures are you implementing now to reduce the likelihood of a pathogen outbreak, or warn a consumer that the food is not safe? 
•  
• • Controlled environment agriculture can reduce the likelihood of the spread of food borne pathogens due to its ability to control the environment and limit exposure to outside factors. But there is still risk and all agriculture facilities (indoor or out) should remain vigilant to maintain food safety and security in the future. Continued research into efficacies and future technologies will help reduce this risk further.
  •  
• Energy is one of the most expensive component for an indoor growing operation. What is your number of grams that can be grown on the farm in a given month, then divide this by the number of KWH consumed per month. Please give more configuration details, pictures, and growth trial data from these trials.
•  
• • While energy is one of the more significant costs for growing indoors, this industry has great potential to expand. This expansion will be driven by need for fresh produce by expanding population, but the CEA industry must focus on improving its operational efficiency where it can be a vital part of a further efficiently electrified economy.
  •  
  • Benefits derived from improved operational efficiency and higher yield can also help CEA facilities minimize labor costs, which are typically they highest costs.
  • The combination of improved technologies, operational efficiency improvements, and maximized labor costs can help assure CEA facilities that their products are competitive.
  •  
  • CEA integration with an electrified economy will also make CEA a key part of future smart cities.
  •  
  • The smart city integration of CEA will be further enhanced by use of grid integrated renewable energy and other distributed energy. As these resources come online, access to affordable and clean energy resources will help shift the energy costs of CEA facilities.  We will be exploring this aspect of CEA in great detail during our 2018 Electrification conference in Long Beach this summer. 
  • With further electrification and demand on the grid, additional research is critical to learn how to support grid stability and reliability as more CEA operations come online.
  •  
  • We are working with utilities and CEA operations around the world to learn more about emerging technologies and identifying proper placement of these operations on the existing grid. 

"Going ‘Green’ Can Be Profitable And Sustainable"

Guy Galonska, INFARM:

"Going ‘Green’ Can Be Profitable And Sustainable"

Our busy, modern lives demand that fresh produce be available 365 days a year, even though some varieties may only be seasonal and/or produced on the other side of the world. The result is a food system centered on quantity, low prices, and efficiency rather than on quality, sustainability and traceability.

The EU-funded INFARM (The vertical farming revolution, Urban Farming as a Service) project reflects a growing desire for highly nutritious locally grown food, which is free of herbicides and pesticides and addresses the lack of accountability in the current food system. “By growing produce directly where people eat and live, we can cut out the lengthy supply chain, significantly reduce food waste, offer nutrient-dense food without any chemical pesticides and improve the environmental ‘foodprint’ of our plants,” says the INFARM’s Chief Technical Officer and co-founder, Guy Galonska.

The answer lies in vertical farming, which grows food in vertically stacked layers under carefully controlled conditions, using hydroponics and light-emitting diodes (LEDs) that mimic sunlight. INFARM takes the concept a step further by employing its smart modular farming units throughout the city. “Rather than asking ourselves how to fix the deficiencies in the current supply chain, we wanted to redesign the entire chain from start to finish; Instead of building large-scale farms outside of the city, optimising on a specific yield, and then distributing the produce, we decided it would be more effective to distribute the farms themselves and farm directly where people live and eat,” Galonska explains.

Use of technology
Each farming unit is its own individual ecosystem, creating the exact environment for plants to flourish. By developing the optimal light spectrum, temperature, pH, and nutrients researchers can ensure the best possible flavour, colour and nutritional quality for each plant, whether it be rocket from Provence, Mexican tarragon or Moroccan mint.

The distributed farms are connected by INFARM’s central farming platform, creating a first of its kind farming network: “Each farm acts as a data pipeline, sending information on plant growth to our platform 24/7 allowing it to learn, adjust and optimise.” A matrix of sensors collects and records data, enabling researchers to remotely optimise the growth of the plants in real-time. This information is also fed into the central farming platform, ensuring its continual development and improvement.

The design of the growing trays mimics the petal pattern of the sunflower, which represents the most efficient arrangement of space in nature. The tray moves plants from the centre to the outer perimeter according to their size and growth. Young seedlings are placed in the centre of the spiral and are harvested from the outside when matured. This design allows fresh produce to be harvested each day at a significantly higher output than comparable technologies.

Supply chain reduced
INFARM is now operating more than 50 farms across Berlin in supermarket aisles, restaurant kitchens and distribution warehouses. In addition to the in-store farms, INFARM has successfully installed and activated a large-scale seedling plant and logistical support system that allows the continued, successful operation of all farming units.

These results are the first step towards creating an urban farming network in Berlin that will ultimately make the city more self-sufficient in its food production. According to Galonska: “With our system, we have completely reduced the food supply chain, as our produce is grown in the heart of the city, often directly at points-of-sale. Thus, customers can purchase fresh produce, minutes after being picked, thereby retaining all its original nutritional qualities, which are lost when the produce is transported and refrigerated.”

Those benefiting from the work of INFARM range from small grocers to global retail conglomerates and governments interested in water conservation, food security and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Galonska concludes, “INFARM’s innovative business model has attracted major interest and I believe that our success will serve as proof, to both aspiring entrepreneurs and established companies, that going ‘green’ can be profitable and sustainable.”

Source: European Commission

Publication date: 5/28/2018

3,000-Year-Old Olive Tree On The Island of Crete Still Produces Olives Today

in Life, Nature | May 9th, 2018

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Image by David Hodgson, via Flickr Commons

in Life, Nature | May 9th, 2018 

On the island of Crete, in the village of Vouves, stands an olive tree estimated to be 3,000 years old. Hearty and resilient, "the Olive Tree of Vouves" still bears fruit today. Because, yes, olives are apparently considered a fruit.

Archaeologist Ticia Verveer posted a picture of the tree on Twitter earlier this week and noted: It "stood here when Rome burned in AD64, and Pompeii was buried under a thick carpet of volcanic ash in AD79." That all happened during the tree's infancy alone.

An estimated 20,000 people now visit the tree each year. If you can't swing a trip to Crete, you can take a virtual tour of the Olive Tree Museum of Vouves (it requires Flash) and see this 3D model of the tree.

Across the Mediterranean, you'll find six other olive trees believed to be 2,000-3,000 years old--some of our last living ties to an ancient world. And beautiful ones at that.

via @ticiaverveer

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OPEN CULTURE

Why The Biochar Industry Is Expected To Gain Popularity Across The Globe Between 2012-2025?

Sustainable Agriculture - Rima d'souza - Senior Research Associate

Why The Biochar Industry Is Expected To Gain Popularity Across The Globe Between 2012-2025?

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1. Biochar is an emerging industry and the product is at its nascent stage. The product is expected to be a key factor for increasing agricultural productivity and crop yield in the near future. Its ability to enhance soil fertility and plant growth is expected to be a key factor on account of growing global population and rising demand for organic food. 

2. Agriculture was the largest product category in 2017 and is expected to grow substantially over the forecast period. Farming was the major application segment in agriculture with a share of over 51.8% in 2017.

3. The global biochar market is expected to reach USD 3,146.1 million by 2025, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc.

4. Application in agriculture segment is expected to observe the fastest growth over the next nine years with an estimated CAGR of around 12.5% from 2018 to 2025. Biochar is primarily used in agriculture to enhance soil fertility, improve plant growth, and provide crop nutrition. 

5. As a result, it improves the overall productivity. It has also gained considerable popularity in livestock farming as an animal feed. The livestock sector is extremely crucial for biochar, especially in regions such as North America and Europe where meat is important for human consumption.

6. Global demand in pyrolysis was USD 737 million in 2017 and is anticipated to witness staggered growth over the next nine years

7. Key players including VerdiLife, Diacarbon Energy Inc, Vega Biofuels Inc., and Agri-Tech Producers, LLC have invested heavily in gasification technology and are expected to expand their production facilities over the forecast period.

 

 

 

VerdiLife

How Technologies Can Save Our Earth’s Resources

How Technologies Can Save Our Earth’s Resources

By Ansh Sharma

May 17, 2018

It’s not a secret that within a bit more than a century, the world science has made a quantum leap that led to numerous technical and technological inventions in various fields and industries.

Today, we can hardly imagine our life without the Internet, mobile telecommunications, wireless connections, and a whole variety of gadgets and items that make our life easier, work more efficiently, and leisure more enjoyable. However, the biggest paradox about this vigorous technological breakthrough is that technologization and industrialization severely impact the environment and exhaust natural resources. In fact, we are slowly “killing” the Earth, which is our common home, with our own hands.

Initially aimed at life improvement, today, the technological progress might lead to a global disaster. Greenhouse effect, freshwater, and food shortage as well as the lack of other vital resources are not a myth anymore but rather a frightening reality. For this reason, the world leading scientists and inventors join their efforts to stop this and make technologies work for the humanity and help solve our environmental problems.  

Renewable Energy

Solar water heaters, solar chargers, and solar powered outdoor lights, as well as other major and minor heating and lighting solutions based on the solar energy, are already common things for many households and even enterprises all over the world. With the energy and fuel being the biggest issues, modern technologies are being maximized and optimized to efficiently turn the power of wind, sun, and water into energy to replace traditional energy sources.

Let’s Drive Electric Cars  

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions destroying the ozone layer are the biggest hazard for the atmosphere. Industrial plants powered by natural gas, coal and other types of fuel as well as ordinary vehicles, quickly growing in numbers, are the major CO2 generators. While it is still pretty hard to find a truly functional technological solution for factories and large-scale plants, today, we can easily replace a gasoline-powered vehicle by an electric car to cut at least some part of harmful CO2 emissions. Recently, scientists have also introduced a device that can recycle CO2 emissions to obtain a hydrocarbon fuel.

Living in Smarter Homes

There has been developed a great many technologies to set up a so-called smart and environmentally friendly home. These are mostly intended to reduce energy loss and, as a result, energy consumption by controlling heating, air conditioning, lighting, and ventilation systems operation.

High-tech Agriculture

Growing population needs more food while growing cities leave less land for traditional agriculture. Vertical farms that can be arranged in urban skyscrapers will help produce crops all year round even in non-agricultural areas. Meanwhile, robots designed specifically for farming can handle anything from simple planting to complex monitoring that will let greatly optimize basic processes.

Though many environmental technological inventions still require optimization, improvement, and enhancement to become viable and fully functional, great chances are that in a decade or so, they will become mainstream and will seem the only correct solutions.

Keeping A Close Eye On Ice Loss

Sea Level Rise

Keeping A Close Eye On Ice Loss

AWI contributes two million euros towards the cost of a new satellite mission

[17. May 2018] 

A few months ago, the GRACE mission’s two Earth observation satellites burnt up in the atmosphere. Although this loss was planned, for the experts at the Alfred Wegener Institute it left a considerable gap in monitoring ice loss in the Antarctic and Greenland. Now the follow-up mission will finally be launched, and will play a vital role in predicting future sea level rise.

Without a doubt, one of the greatest threats in connection with climate change is the continuing rise in sea level– and the more intensively the enormous ice sheets in Greenland and the Antarctic melt, the worse it will become. To more accurately gauge the loss in mass of these large ice sheets, scientists at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) permanently evaluate Earth observation data gleaned from satellites. For them, the GRACE satellites were an extremely important pair of spacecraft.

They had been in orbit since 2002, but in 2017, at the ripe old age of 15 they were decommissioned, and early this year they made a controlled re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere, where they burnt up as planned. Ever since then, the AWI experts and the international research community have had to do without an important source of information on the condition of the large ice sheets. 

And now, to fill that gap, at 12:47 p.m. PST on 22 May 2018 the successor, GRACE Follow-On (GRACE-FO) will be launched into orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California (USA). “We’re delighted,” says AWI geophysicist Ingo Sasgen.“For 15 years, the GRACE mission provided us with unique and fascinating time sequences on the ice sheets’ mass losses. Since June 2017, this time sequence has been interrupted, which means that we don’t have any data on the last melt season in Greenland. It’s very good news that the measurements are now going to be continued.”

GRACE stands for “Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment”. As the name suggests, the satellites' task is to measure the Earth’s gravitational field on a monthly basis. This gravity data can then be used by various experts for different purposes. It is particularly important for the AWI’s researchers because the changes in ice mass in Greenland and the Antarctic can be clearly seen in the Earth’s gravitational field. If more ice is lost as a result of melting or calving than can be recovered through snowfall, the mass of the ice sheet decreases, and so does the gravitational field in that area. Accordingly, the GRACE measurements can tell us whether or not, where, and by how much the ice sheets shrink or grow. 

The two GRACE satellites employ a microwave radar system to permanently measure the distance between them and normally fly approximately 220 kilometers apart. If the first satellite flies over an area with higher gravity, it is slightly attracted and thereby accelerated. This increases its distance from the second satellite, and the discrepancy shows how great the change in gravity is within a radius of circa 400 km. The accuracy of this approach is extraordinary – it can measure the distance between the twin satellites to within a few micrometers.  

The new GRACE mission will also rely on microwave radar. “To allow the second mission to launch quickly and not to lose too much time and risk gaps in the data, the choice was made to use tried and trusted technologies,” explains Ingo Sasgen. “However, there is also a laser measuring device on board, which will be tested during the mission. Roughly 25 times more accurate than the microwave radar, we believe it can further improve the gravitational field analysis.” 

As with the previous mission, the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ) and NASA are providing the scientific support for the GRACE-FO mission. The German Aerospace Center will carry out the mission on behalf of the GFZ. In turn, the AWI will contribute not only its ice expertise but also two million euros to help cover the cost of the Falcon 9 booster rocket from SpaceX.  

The data provided by GRACE-FO will be essential, as it will not only allow Ingo Sasgen and his colleagues to help determine how major ice sheets are responding to the on-going global warming; they will also feed the data into mathematical models known as numerical climate models to predict how ice losses will evolve over time. Further, GRACE-FO will conduct high-precision gravity-field measurements, which experts at the AWI will combine with readings from other satellites, e.g. CryoSat-2, which uses radar to accurately measure the thickness of the sea-ice cover. CryoSat-2can be used e.g. to identify which parts of an ice sheet had the most snowfall. In addition, GRACE-FO will scan 400-kilometer grid sections, which is comparatively coarse. Measuring five-kilometer sections on average, CryoSat-2 offers significantly higher resolution. But CryoSat-2 has limitations of its own: its radar sweep also penetrates into the upper layers of snow and ice, making it difficult to precisely measure their thickness, especially since the exact conditions on-site are unknown.

To compensate for this aspect, the AWI also takes calibration readings with its research aircraft. A further source of uncertainty: over time, snow collapses under its own weight, which can skew measurements of its thickness. According to Ingo Sasgen, “With the CryoSat-2 data alone, it’s impossible to say whether a change in the thickness of ice and snow was produced by the snow compacting, or by melting. That’s why we need GRACE Follow-On; the respective change in the gravitational field shows us whether or not ice and snow are actually being lost.” In essence, the satellites constitute a perfect match, as they offer complementary strengths.  

With the start of the GRACE-FO mission, after roughly a year an important gap in satellite monitoring will become a thing of the past. As with its predecessor, the planned mission duration is five years. But Ingo Sasgen hopes that the second generation, just like the first, might continue to provide data for as long as 15 years. “We would then have a time series covering roughly 30 years, which would mean a truly representative timespan for climate models. The data gained will be a valuable resource for climate research, today and for decades to come.”

Video: NASA

“The 2020’s Will Be The Decade of The Vertical Agriculture Revolution”- Ray Kurzweil, Director of Engineering at Google

“The 2020’s Will Be The Decade of The Vertical Agriculture Revolution”

- Ray Kurzweil, Director of Engineering at Google

MAY 30, 2018, BY SCOTT MASSEY

Indoor agriculture has gained an explosive amount of traction in past few years as it has been recognized as a viable solution to solve food and sustainability issues by offering the potential to grow and distribute produce near areas of demand.

     For a planet with declining resources, indoor agriculture is a key component to improving food safety while reducing waste and growing more nutritious food in highly controlled environments that utilize electric lighting, thermal, and sensing controls. These include a 90% reduction in water usage, reduced transportation pollution and elimination of soil and additives. With the rising population and the decreasing costs of LED energy, there’s never been a better time to explore electrification of the indoor agriculture industry, which has the potential to fuel the future of sustainability.

     However, there were still a number of technical hurdles that must be overcome for this technology to have a meaningful impact in yields of food production. The largest of which is astronomical energy costs due to indoor lighting preventing indoor agriculture from being a financially viable enterprise without dependence on government subsidies. In this industry glance, we met electrical and software engineering representatives to hear about their methods to reduce the operational cost and increase the profitability of CEA (controlled environment agriculture).

    The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) conducts research and development relating to the generation, delivery, and use of electricity for the benefit of the public. An independent, nonprofit organization, EPRI brings together its scientists and engineers as well as experts from academia and industry to help address challenges in electricity, including reliability, efficiency, health, safety and the environment. EPRI's members represent more than 90 percent of the electricity generated and delivered in the United States, and international participation extends to 40 countries.

Q&A: Frank Sharp, Senior Technical Leader, Energy Utilization, EPRI.

What is the best form factor in this industry? 

       EPRI is researching CEA because of its potential to address issues related to population growth, food security, food safety, water access, water use, sustainability, grid load, local job creation, land usage, and smart city integration, all for community benefit. That said, we see three primary emerging forms and each has benefits:

1. The converted warehouse, vertical farm, custom building

• This provides an opportunity to use underutilized or underperforming real estate in areas that often have limited economic potential. These facilities offer the ability to yield high quality produce in large volumes near population centers via their use of technologies to maintain ideal growing conditions.

• 2. Converted shipping containers or pods

• This approach is highly mobile, is often modular, and utilize modern technologies to maintain growing conditions. These facilities offer the ability to reliability deliver fresh produce to targeted communities and applications and use minimal resources.

• 3. Augmented greenhouses where heat and lighting are added to keep the greenhouse operating year-round.

•  
• This format has a lower operational cost per square foot since it’s lighting load is only utilized when sunlight is not available

     These facilities have the ability to deliver crops in large scale and deliver fresh produce year-round to markets. We found a lot of unanswered questions about each of these types of controlled environment agriculture and they all warrant significantly more research as we move forward. We are working with utilities and CEA groups to better leverage current technology to forward each of these formats for the public benefit.

     In addition to these three forms, there are other forms developing like aquaculture, indoor shrimp production, and insects for protein.

     Note, established industries like traditional greenhouses and floriculture operations are also very common and will continue to expand and be utilized. These operations are typically not researched by EPRI since their operations and technologies are well established. EPRI does follow work in these areas and will engage to evaluate new process and technologies in these operations if they emerge.   

With major e Coli and other pathogen outbreak concerns plaguing the food landscape, CEA is a viable solution if implemented correctly. What measures are you implementing now to reduce the likelihood of a pathogen outbreak, or warn a consumer that the food is not safe?

     Controlled environment agriculture can reduce the likelihood of the spread of foodborne pathogens due to its ability to control the environment and limit exposure to outside factors. But there is still a risk and all agriculture facilities (indoor or out) should remain vigilant to maintain food safety and security in the future. Continued research into efficacies and future technologies will help reduce this risk further.

Energy is one of the most expensive components for an indoor growing operation. What is your number of grams that can be grown on the farm in a given month, then divide this by the number of KWH consumed per month? Please give more configuration details, pictures, and growth trial data from these trials.

      While energy is one of the more significant costs of growing indoors, this industry has great potential to expand. This expansion will be driven by the need for fresh produce by expanding the population, but the CEA industry must focus on improving its operational efficiency where it can be a vital part of a further efficiently electrified economy.

      Benefits derived from improved operational efficiency and higher yield can also help CEA facilities minimize labor costs, which are typically the highest costs. The combination of improved technologies, operational efficiency improvements, and maximized labor costs can help assure CEA facilities that their products are competitive.

     CEA integration with an electrified economy will also make CEA a key part of future smart cities.

     The smart city integration of CEA will be further enhanced by the use of grid-integrated renewable energy and other distributed energy. As these resources come online, access to affordable and clean energy resources will help shift the energy costs of CEA facilities.  We will be exploring this aspect of CEA in great detail during our 2018 Electrification conference in Long Beach this summer.

     With further electrification and demand on the grid, additional research is critical to learning how to support grid stability and reliability as more CEA operations come online.

We are working with utilities and CEA operations around the world to learn more about emerging technologies and identifying proper placement of these operations on the existing grid.

How Oman’s Rocks Could Help Save the Planet

How Oman’s Rocks Could Help Save the Planet

By HENRY FOUNTAIN APRIL 26, 2018

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Peter B. Kelemen, a Columbia University geologist near Muscat, Oman.

The rocks here in Oman are special, this scientist says. They remove
planet-warming carbon dioxide from the air and turn it to stone. In theory,
these rocks could store hundreds of years of human emissions of CO2.

Storing even a fraction of that would not be easy. But it’s not impossible.

Henry Fountain, a New York Times reporter covering climate science, went to Oman to learn more about the science. Vincent Fournier, a photographer, captured the landscape.

APRIL 26, 2018

IBRA, Oman — In the arid vastness of this corner of the Arabian Peninsula, out where goats and the occasional camel roam, rocks form the backdrop practically every way you look.

But the stark outcrops and craggy ridges are more than just scenery. Some of these rocks are hard at work, naturally reacting with carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and turning it into stone.

Veins of white carbonate minerals run through slabs of dark rock like fat marbling a steak. Carbonate surrounds pebbles and cobbles, turning ordinary gravel into natural mosaics.

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Carbonate veins form when water containing dissolved carbon dioxide flows through these rocks.

Even pooled spring water that has bubbled up through the rocks reacts with CO2 to produce an ice-like crust of carbonate that, if broken, re-forms within days.

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When the water comes back into contact with air, a thin layer of carbonate hardens across its surface.

Scientists say that if this natural process, called carbon mineralization, could be harnessed, accelerated and applied inexpensively on a huge scale — admittedly some very big “ifs” — it could help fight climate change. Rocks could remove some of the billions of tons of heat-trapping carbon dioxide that humans have pumped into the air since the beginning of the Industrial Age.

And by turning that CO2 into stone, the rocks in Oman — or in a number of other places around the world that have similar geological formations — would ensure that the gas stayed out of the atmosphere forever.

“Solid carbonate minerals aren’t going anyplace,” said Peter B. Kelemen, a geologist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory who has been studying the rocks here for more than two decades.

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The New York Times | Source: Peter B. Kelemen, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory

Capturing and storing carbon dioxide is drawing increased interest. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says that deploying such technology is essential to efforts to rein in global warming. But the idea has barely caught on: There are fewer than 20 large-scale projects in operation around the world, and they remove CO2 from the burning of fossil fuels at power plants or from other industrial processes and store it as gas underground.

What Dr. Kelemen and others have in mind is removing carbon dioxide that is already in the air, to halt or reverse the gradual increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration. Direct-air capture, as it is known, is sometimes described as a form of geoengineering — deliberate manipulation of the climate — although that term is more often reserved for the idea of reducing warming by reflecting more sunlight away from the earth.

Although many researchers dismiss direct-air capture as logistically or economically impractical, especially given the billions of tons of gas that would have to be removed to have an impact, some say it may have to be considered if other efforts to counter global warming are ineffective.

A few researchers and companies have built machines that can pull CO2 out of the air, in relatively small quantities, but adapting and enhancing natural capture processes using rocks is less developed.

“This one still feels like the most nascent piece of the conversation,” said Noah Deich, executive director of the Center for Carbon Removal, a research organization in Berkeley, Calif. “You see these sparks, but I don’t see anything catching fire yet.”

Dr. Kelemen is one of a relative handful of researchers around the world who are studying the idea. At a geothermal power plant in Iceland, after several years of experimentation, an energy company is currently injecting modest amounts of carbon dioxide into volcanic rock, where it becomes mineralized. Dutch researchers have suggested spreading a kind of crushed rock along coastlines to capture CO2. And scientists in Canada and South Africa are studying ways to use mine wastes, called tailings, to do the same thing.

“It’s clear that we’re going to have to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere,” said Roger Aines, who leads the development of carbon management technologies at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and has worked with Dr. Kelemen and others. “And we’re going to have to do it on a gigaton scale.”

If billions of tons of CO2 are to be turned to stone, there are few places in the world more suitable than Oman, a sultanate with a population of 4 million and an economy based on oil and, increasingly, tourism.

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A view of Muscat, the capital. The tower in the distance, in Al Riyam Park, was inspired by an incense burner.

The carbon-capturing formations here, consisting largely of a rock called peridotite, are in a slice of oceanic crust and the mantle layer below it that was thrust up on land by tectonic forces nearly 100 million years ago. Erosion has resulted in a patchy zone about 200 miles long, up to 25 miles wide and several miles thick in the northern part of the country, including here in the outskirts of Ibra, a dusty inland city of 50,000. Even the bustling capital, Muscat, on the Gulf of Oman, has a pocket of peridotite practically overlooking Sultan Qaboos bin Said’s palace.

Peridotite normally is miles below the earth’s surface. When the rocks are exposed to air or water as they are here, Dr. Kelemen said, they are like a giant battery with a lot of chemical potential. “They’re really, really far from equilibrium with the atmosphere and surface water,” he said.

The rocks are so extensive, Dr. Kelemen said, that if it was somehow possible to fully use them they could store hundreds of years of CO2 emissions. More realistically, he said, Oman could store at least a billion tons of CO2 annually. (Current yearly worldwide emissions are close to 40 billion tons.)

While the formations here are special, they are not unique. Similar though smaller ones are found in Northern California, Papua New Guinea and Albania, among other places.

Dr. Kelemen first came to Oman in the 1990s, as the thrust-up rocks were one of the best sites in the world to study what was then his area of research, the formation and structure of the earth’s crust. He’d noticed the carbonate veins but thought they must be millions of years old.

“There was a feeling that carbon mineralization was really slow and not worth thinking about,” he said.

But in 2007, he had some of the carbonate dated. Almost all of it was less than 50,000 years old, suggesting that the mineralization process was actually much faster.

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Carbonate veins show how CO2 can be stored as rock.

“So then I said, O.K., this is pretty cool,” Dr. Kelemen said.

Since then, in addition to continuing his crust research, he has spent much time studying the prospects for harnessing the mineralization process — among other things, learning about the water chemistry, which changes as it flows through the rocks, and measuring the actual uptake of CO2 from the air in certain spots.

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Solid white carbonate, settled at the bottom of a pool.

For much of this decade, he has also led a multinational effort to drill boreholes in the rock, a $4 million project that is only partly related to carbon capture. In March the drilling was nearing completion, with scientists and technicians sending instruments down the holes, which are up to 1,300 feet deep, to better characterize the rock layers.

The rocks here may be capable of capturing a lot of carbon dioxide, but the challenge is doing it much faster than nature, in huge amounts and at low enough cost to make it more than a pipe dream. Dr. Kelemen and his colleagues, including Juerg Matter, a researcher from the University of Southampton in England who was involved in the Icelandic project, have some ideas.

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A crew drilling a borehole outside Ibra, part of a project to better understand the geology of Oman.

One possibility, Dr. Kelemen said, would be to drill pairs of wells and pump water with dissolved CO2 into one of them. As the water traveled through the rock formation carbonate would form; when it reached the other well the water, now depleted of CO2, would be pumped out. The process could be repeated over and over.

There is a lot that is unknown about such an approach, however. For one thing, while pumping water deep into the earth, where temperatures and pressures are higher, could make the process of mineralization go tens of thousands of times faster, so much carbonate might form that the water flow would stop. “You might clog everything up, and it would all come to a screeching halt,” Dr. Kelemen said.

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Drillers sample the cuttings from the borehole every meter of depth so geologists can analyze the rock.

Experiments and eventually pilot projects are needed to better understand and optimize this process and others, Dr. Kelemen said, but so far Omani officials have been reluctant to grant the necessary permits. The researchers may need to go elsewhere, like California, where the rocks are less accessible but the state government has set ambitious targets for reducing emissions and is open to new ways to meet them.

Dr. Kelemen and Dr. Aines have had preliminary discussions with California officials about the possibility of experimenting there. “We would certainly be a willing and eager partner to help them with it,” said David Bunn, director of the State Department of Conservation.

Perhaps the simplest way to use rocks to capture carbon dioxide would be to quarry large amounts of them, grind them into fine particles and spread them out to expose them to the air. The material could be turned over from time to time to expose fresh surfaces, or perhaps air with a higher CO2 concentration could be pumped into it to speed up the process.

But a quarrying and grinding operation of the scale required would be hugely expensive, scar the landscape and produce enormous CO2 emissions of its own. So a few researchers are asking, Why not use rocks that have already been quarried and ground up for other purposes?

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A small mountain of carbonate-rich rocks outside Lizugh, a town southwest of Muscat. Iron in the rocks has oxidized, turning them red.

Such rocks are found in large amounts at mines around the world, as waste tailings. Platinum, nickel and diamonds, in particular, are mined from rock that has a lot of carbon-mineralization potential.

Gregory Dipple, a researcher at the University of British Columbia who has been studying mine tailings for more than a decade, said early on he found evidence that waste rock was forming carbonate without any human intervention. “It was clear it was taking CO2 from the air,” he said.

Dr. Dipple is now working with several mining companies and studying ways to improve upon the natural process. The goal would be to capture at least enough CO2 to fully offset a mine’s carbon emissions, which typically come from trucks and on-site power generation.

Evelyn Mervine, who has worked with Dr. Dipple and Dr. Kelemen and now works for De Beers, the world’s largest diamond company, is studying a similar approach and hopes by next year to conduct trials at one or more of the company’s mines.

“We don’t think from a scientific perspective it would be that difficult or expensive — we can be carbon-neutral,” she said. “And in the mining industry that is extraordinary.”

“Relative to the global problem, it’s really just a drop in the bucket,” Dr. Mervine said. “But it sets a really good precedent.”

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Dr. Kelemen has spent more than 20 years researching these rocks in Oman.

Correction April 27, 2018

An earlier version of this article described incorrectly the presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. While it accounts for four-fifths of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions, it is not the most prevalent heat-trapping gas. Water vapor is more abundant.

Designed and produced by Claire O'Neill and Danny DeBelius. Map by Tim Wallace.

Climate-Smart Villages Launch In Myanmar

Climate-Smart Villages Launch In Myanmar

from CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security

Published on 26 Apr 2018 —View Original

by Wilson John Barbon (IIRR) and Eisen Bernardo (CCAFS Southeast Asia)

The establishment of Climate-Smart and Nutrition-Smart Villages in Myanmar is a major step in addressing food security and nutrition challenges.

In Myanmar, the adverse impacts of climate change are observed especially in the agriculture sector, due to increasing incidence of drought, more intense rains resulting in flooding, stronger cyclones, and salinization of farms. As an agricultural country with many smallholder farmers, the country’s food security, nutrition and livelihoods are greatly affected by the threats of climate change.

The scaling out of climate-smart agriculture technologies and practices (CSA T&Ps) using community-based adaptation (CBA) strategies is a potential solution to food security and nutrition challenges in Myanmar. To realize this goal, the International Institute of Rural Reconstruction (IIRR), with support from the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security in Southeast Asia (CCAFS SEA), has worked for the establishment of Climate-Smart and Nutrition-Smart Villages (CSVs) to serve as platforms for scaling out CSA T&Ps through CBA in the country.

The CCAFS-funded short program supporting strategic field-level activities has led to more resources and support from key stakeholders. Particularly, the International Development Research Center (IDRC) provided funding for a three-year project that will fully implement the CSV program in Myanmar.

The new project, Scaling Out Community-Based Adaptation via Climate Smart Villages: Platforms to Address Food Insecurity in Myanmar, will look into how a network of CSVs implementing CBA processes can effectively influence potential next users to replicate such processes. Building on the current knowledge base on undertaking gender-sensitive, nutrition-friendly CBA, and local-level scaling-out of CSA, the project will be implemented through participatory action research in four selected villages.

CSV launching and inception workshop

In April 2018 in Yangon, IIRR launched the four CSVs in Myanmar, namely: Ma Sein village in Bogale (delta), Htee Pu village in Nyaung-Oo (dry zone), Kyaung Taung village in Nyaung Shwe (uplands), and Sakthal village in Hakha (hilly). The CSVs will serve as learning platforms for scaling-out CSA through CBA at the township level.

As part of the event, IIRR conducted the project’s inception workshop, gathering all implementing partners and other agencies providing technical assistance. During the workshop, the partners agreed on the expectations for their roles in the project, acquired a common understanding of the approaches and themes of the research, and drafted an initial budget and coordination mechanisms.

For this year, the focus will be on building the baselines for the research, including the conduct and finalization of participatory vulnerability assessment reports, household surveys, and gender studies. The project will be producing primers in local languages which will be used in the CSV-level education activities for target farmers and households.

Opening-wedge activities

In 2016, IIRR organized a roundtable discussion to explore the opportunities for CSA in Myanmar. Following the roundtable discussion, with support from CCAFS, IIRR carried out an in-depth scoping study to look into climate vulnerabilities in agriculture in the various agro-ecological zones of Myanmar.

In 2017, CCAFS provided a small grant to implement preliminary activities to set up two CSVs in the central dry zone and delta areas. These included participatory vulnerability assessments, testing of identified CSA options, and building partnerships with local NGOs. In Htee Pu village, IIRR and its partner the Community Development Association implemented participatory varietal selection of pigeon pea, ground nuts and green gram, and distribution of mango seedlings to demonstrate small-scale fruit tree orchards. In Ma Sein village, IIRR, together with Radanar Ayar Association, conducted testing of household-level container gardening and backyard pig raising, and set up a school garden to demonstrate vegetable production and small-scale fish culture for educating children and parents about the value of diversification.

IIRR believes that capacities to experiment and test CSA options should be nurtured by engaging farmers in observation trials and participatory varietal selection processes. Such activities help encourage farmer-to-farmer processes which often outlast the technologies. Over time, incremental adaptation is observed.

Considered “opening wedge” activities, these initial efforts aimed to build trust and cooperation between the IIRR and its partners and the smallholder farmers. These activities are meant to excite farmers about the various options that they can explore, test, and develop to address issues related to climate change. The next phase will focus on deepening the implementation of options and documenting the results of these with regards to reducing the risks to farmers brought by climate change.

In the near future, IIRR will partner with Yezin Agriculture University and local research stations to develop a portfolio of CSA options relevant to different agro-ecologies and sociocultural settings. Equity, gender, and nutrition considerations will be featured in the design of local strategies. In homesteads, schools, and every CSV, small farms will serve as complementary platforms for promoting CSA in this effort to strengthen local adaptive capacities.

Report Back From EcoFarm on Eliminating Hunger

Report Back From EcoFarm on Eliminating Hunger

By Peter Ruddock

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In his keynote speech at EcoFarm 2018, John Ikerd proposed that “Eliminating hunger is the first requisite of agricultural sustainability.” John told us, as he has written before, that “Thus far, the sustainable agriculture movement has put far more emphasis on the second requisite for sustainability than on the first—on developing an ecologically sound, economically viable approach to farming.” And he backed this up with what may be a startling statistic to some: “In 1968, when CBS-TV aired its classic documentary, “Hunger in America,” an estimated 5% of the people in the U.S. were hungry, which was considered a national emergency. Nearly fifty years later, in 2015, more than 12% of Americans were “food insecure” and more than 16% of American children lived in food insecure homes.” The world, he reminded us, grows plenty of food and yet a large portion of its inhabitants go hungry, or live in fear of doing so, regularly.

John’s fellow keynote speaker, Doria Robinson localized the issue for us. Doria told us about the work that she and her colleagues at Urban Tilth are doing in Richmond, growing food for their community, including that community in decision making, production and more. They are building a resilient community, one that attempts to feed it members, rather than growing for a market, which would default to feed the population who could afford it, while leaving those who could not out. This is a very different goal than business as usual, which posits that if we produce enough everyone will somehow get fed, and never seems to deliver. Not only does Urban Tilth switch the paradigm, growing first for their community, but they honor the second requisite, in caring for the earth and food in the process, knowing that the earth and food will then care for them.

After a short break, Hank Herrera and I joined John Ikerd and Doria Robinson for a workshop, which would take the conversation one level deeper. John talked with us about ideas for local distribution, about “community food utilities”, which would be built upon the notion of feeding the community, rather than filling commodity markets. Hank told us not only about the work that New Hope Farms has been doing in Western Contra Costa County raising food and selling it locally, but also, along with Doria, about the ideas that they have been looking to implement, creating a network of farms, processors, distributors and stores which work together to implement the idea that feeding the community comes first, anticipating the ideas that John had described. My own contributions included the idea of local investment, particularly through Slow Money, with whom I work, to get those who can afford to fund this work, generally through low-interest, high-impact loans, to also become a positive force in creating this local, healthy, resilient community, by making sure that their money circulated in their community, enriching it, rather than departing for unknown shareholders far away.

This being EcoFarm, a lively discussion followed, with an engaged crowd asking questions, contributing their own ideas, examples and, perhaps most especially, enthusiasm to the issue. It is energizing to see so many attendees at EcoFarm want to wrap their arms around the First Requisite and so increase the priority of Eliminating Hunger among those of ecological farming.

By Peter Ruddock

Listen to John and Doria's workshop recording when you purchase the 2018 Workshop Audio Recordings.

Watch their keynote presentation on YouTube.

"Vertical Farming Raises The Bar For Sustainable Agriculture"

Robert Colangelo, Green Sense Farms:

"Vertical Farming Raises The Bar For Sustainable Agriculture"

Sustainability is a hot issue for growers these days. From greenhouses to open-field operations, growers are looking to reduce their impact on the environment. A trailblazing industry in this respect is the vertical farming sector. We spoke to Robert Colangelo, CEO of Green Sense Farms, about the central role sustainability plays in his company.

Robert Colangelo isn't your typical farmer. He's founded ten environmental startups that all deal with sustainability. "My philosophy has always been market-based solutions to environmental problems. If you find an economic solution, you're going to solve problems much more efficiently than if forced by legislation."

Green Sense Farms, which builds and operates vertical farms around the world, is one of his most successful ventures. Another area of activity for him is brownfield redevelopment. While educating people about building sustainable cities and building green projects on brownfields, he came across many sustainability initiatives. With no dedicated medium to report advancements, Robert decided to start one himself: the Green Sense radio show, which is syndicated on 37 stations, and available as a podcast.

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Solar flight as inspiration
The guests on the radio show serve as an inspiration to Robert and Green Sense Farms. In one of the episodes, he interviewed Bertrand Piccard, who completed the first successful round-the-world solar-powered flight. "When I asked him how he flew a plane at night when there is no solar power, he said 'our first goal was to make a plane fly with the least amount of energy possible'. I took that and thought, when we build our farms, that's the first thing we need to look at. How do we build a farm that's super energy efficient?"

Reduce, reuse, recycle, rot
Robert goes on to explain the goals at Green Sense Farms: reduce, reuse, recycle, and rot. "Anything that we can't do for the first three, we try to compost. The second is to use as little energy as possible and to use renewable energy sources where we can. The next goal is biomimicry: how do we mimic nature in an indoor growing facility, and how do we use gravity instead of pumps as much as possible?" The most important goal though, Robert says, is recycling nutrients. "We're at about 99 percent right now."

The ideal growing recipe
Green Sense has partnerships with a number of companies: "With Hortimax for our fertigation, with Desert Aire for our climate control systems, with Dramm for our water filtration, and we're working with a number of LED light companies right now to find the best-LED light."

It's not just about light though. "I would call it a 'growing recipe'", Robert says. "It's all interrelated: if you change your substrate, it impacts your watering, impacts the climate, impacts the light. And most importantly, we're working with our seed manufacturers to breed seeds that will grow best indoors under LED lights."

Traditional greenhouses, vertical farms: side by side
Breeding special seeds is just one of the ways in which Green Sense is looking to collaborate with others to find the best way to grow vertical farming crops. They look to the traditional greenhouse industry as well. "Greenhouses are very technically advanced. The only challenge is that they need a lot of land and are still impacted a bit by the weather."

Robert believes vertical farming has raised the bar for sustainability in agriculture, but they're not competing with traditional agriculture and the greenhouse industry. "We can use different growing technologies for different crops. For example, field farms with precision farming can be very sustainable now, and they're great for growing commodity crops like wheat, soybeans, and corn. Greenhouses are fantastic, and are very sustainable, if they're operated properly, especially the new high-tech ones, and they're great for growing tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers. Vertical farms are great for growing leafy greens and herbs."

"Organic promotes mediocrity"
Growing sustainably in vertical farms is not the same thing as growing organically, Robert notes. "We're not a big fan of organic. We think that organic is very misunderstood by the consumer. People think they're getting a lot more than they're actually getting with the organic stamp of approval. Organic is a philosophy for growing in soil, but I think there are much better ways to grow vegetables that are good for people and the planet."

He points to the need of a new sustainable growing standard instead of the traditional organic label. "We think there should be a standard that's much like the LEED standard for buildings, where you actually rate a farm on its energy use, water management, its proximity to the customer, it's ability to grow year-round... if you look at a wide range of issues, then the consumer can pick which issues are more important to them, rather than dictating to the consumer.

"Maybe some consumers really want a farm that's local, maybe some want a farm that recycles all their water, maybe others are really concerned about the chemicals. So I think the idea of dictating to the consumer is over, that there needs to be a standard that's more reflective of the impact to the environment and what the consumers feel is important to them."

The problem with the organic label, Robert says, is that it's binary: you either get it or you don't. With a LEED-like standard, you could have a ranking system, and a farm could move up the ranking and become better. "Right now, all you have to do is cross the bar and you're organic. Organic actually promotes mediocrity."

The Art of Sustainability
In addition to growing crops, Robert also sees it as his mission to grow future sustainability leaders. One way in which Green Sense Farms is doing this, is through a partnership with Indiana University. "At our farm, it's really a confluence of art, business, and science. So we thought that it would be nice to teach a course on this."


The first Art of Sustainability mural, which adorns the wall of the farm in Portage, Indiana

Together with Mike Keen, founder of the Center for a Sustainable Future at the university, the course, named 'The Art of Sustainability', was started. Once a year, students learn about the interaction of water, energy, transportation and food production. The students look at how that has changed throughout time. "Cities first formed around the ancient Egyptian grain centers," Robert explains, "because the water, the farm, the people were all close together. As we started to get better technology, roads, people got further apart, and got further apart from their food, until now, where we build robot modules for space, we're back to where we started."

The course takes a look at that evolution of agriculture. Then an artist is brought in, who will interpret this process into a mural of about 40 feet long and 6 feet tall. Every time a new Green Sense farm is built, a student-developed mural is hung in that farm. So far there are two murals adorning the walls of Green Sense farms, with a third one in the works.


The second mural graces the wall of the vertical farm in China

Speaking about those farms, Robert says: "Our model is to build a brand that's nationally known and locally grown. We build a network of farms at our customers' location. Those we own and operate, and we license our technology abroad." At the moment, Green Sense Farms has already licensed their technology in China, and they're working to expand to other Asia-Pacific countries, as well as countries in the Middle East and Scandinavia. So watch this space, because more Green Sense farms are coming.

For more information:
Green Sense Farms
6525 Daniel Burnham Drive, Suite B
Portage, IN 46368-1793
Phone: 219-762-9990
Fax: 219-762-9992
www.greensensefarms.com
 

Publication date: 4/27/2018
Author: Jan Jacob Mekes
Copyright: www.hortidaily.com 

All Aboard The Urban Farm

All Aboard The Urban Farm

The Farmbus is no regular red double-decker: inside it’s a top-spec sustainable strawberry factory. Katie Strick hops on

• KATIE STRICK 

April 19, 2018

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Matt Writtle

The floors are lined with pot plants, tomato vines, and coriander leaves. Hanging baskets swing from the handrails and the driver’s seat is blanketed in a green layer of mint, basil, and thyme. Upstairs, the deck is filled with a fine, ultrasonic mist. 

This is no ordinary double-decker, though. This is the Farmbus, a  new sustainable urban farm for the capital housed inside a converted red London bus. It opened last week at Mercato Metropolitano in Elephant and Castle, and it’ll be open throughout the summer as a pick-your-own farm and plant shop. The first batch of strawberries is expected in the next fortnight. 

The Farmbus offers a unique way to grow sustainable produce in the capital and was created in response to Londoners’ pressing environmental and social concerns, says co-founder Sam Cox. Previously an architect, he teamed up with plant scientist Hugo Horlick to create Rootlabs, a company looking at innovative growing systems in urban environments. This is its first project. 

The bus may have a retro feel but the concept is hi-tech. The strawberry farm on the top deck uses a technology called aeroponics, a food-growing method that doesn’t require soil. Instead, plants are close-suspended in the air and their roots are exposed to a fine, nutritious mist. 

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Inside the Farmbus (Matt Writtle)

Not only does this allow Cox and Horlick to grow strawberries much more densely than they could with traditional methods but it’s also low-impact. The whole system runs on just 45 litres of water — 95 per cent of the water used is recirculated back into the system — and low-powered LED lighting keeps resources at a minimum, Cox explains. 

“In the UK we import a huge amount of soft fruit and strawberries each year and we’re looking at how we can produce these in a very sustainable way.” Farmbus’s climate-controlled growing house is proof to the public that you can grow “substantial amounts of sustainable produce within a very small footprint,” continues Horlick. They hope to install solar panels on the roof in the coming months to help reduce that footprint further. 

Strawberries are not the only fruits of Rootlabs’ endeavors: the Farmbus will also produce herbs for people living nearby and for the restaurants at Mercato Metropolitano, and they’ve recently built a hydroponic hop growing system in partnership with German Kraft, the market’s on-site sustainable brewery. It’s made using recycling beer barrels and the hops will be used to produce beer. 

Community is at the project’s core: throughout the summer, Cox and Horlick will deliver a programme of workshops for the public on hydroponic food growing, indoor gardening advice and houseplants. There will also be free workshops for local schools and a monthly plant consultancy where Londoners can come in for advice on growing at home and find out what they might be doing wrong.  

Cox hopes the “striking” structure of a red double-decker bus will draw people in. “There’s this fantastic landscape of urban growing in London, so we really wanted to create something engaging for the public.” The classic design also seemed a fitting structure in which to house such an iconic British fruit. 

The Farmbus will be parked in Elephant and Castle until the end of summer, after which Cox plans to move it to another London site or even get it moving with a biodiesel engine. “We’re really interested in how we can improve environments through the use of planting, whether that’s for environmental benefits or general health and well-being of our cities and its populations. It’s about resource efficiency and how we can reduce the amount of materials and inputs we have to have.” 

All aboard the sustainable food revolution. 

More about: | Food | London | Pop Up | Fruit | Vegetables |Shopping

GFIA Europe 2018 - Early Bird Ticket Prices End Monday

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Early Bird Ticket Prices End Monday

SAVE €200 ON CONFERENCE TICKETS BEFORE 30 APRIL

Discover more than ever at GFIA Europe 2018. From exhibitions and innovation presentations to discussion forums and technical tours, we have challenged ourselves to offer something of interest to visitors right along the value chain.

BOOK TODAY TO NETWORK WITH OTHER DELEGATES FROM:

• Agrifirm
• Bayer AG
• Copa-Cogeca
• European Commission
• European Council of Young Farmers
• FAO
• KPMG
• LTO Nederland
• McCain Foods
• Ministry of Agriculture, Netherlands
• Netherlands-African Business Council
• Oxfam Novib
• PepsiCo International
• Royal Cosun
• Wageningen UR
• Yara

YOUR TICKET INCLUDES AN ACCESS-ALL-AREAS PASS

Including entry into the Opening Ceremony, Main Conference, International Exhibition, Innovations Theatre, Proagrica Future Farming Theatre, daily delegate lunch, priority access to technical tours, and partner workshops from Bayer AG and Invest in Holland.

PLUS your GFIA badge will get you free entry into VIV Europe and European Halal Expo – both taking place at Jaarbeurs the same week.

USEFUL INFORMATION:

Find out more at www.gfiaeurope.com

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The Three Great Separations

The Three Great Separations

 By john ikerd    April 21, 2018

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We are confronted today with a multidimensional ecological, social, and economic crises that is rooted in our growing sense of disconnectedness from each other and from the earth. In his book, “The Great Turning,” David Korten referred to this crisis as “the great unraveling.” I believe the great unraveling is rooted in “three great separations.”

People in prehistoric civilizations understood the importance of relationships. They had intimate relationships with the earth as well as with the other people with whom they shared the earth. They were hunter gatherers. Indigenous peoples relied on each other also for companionship as well as their survival. Many also considered the heavens and earth as the embodiment of their concept of God. That being said, their relationships with nature and with each other were clearly relationships of physical or material necessity.

The agricultural revolution of some 10,000 to 12,000 years ago brought about a fundamental transformation of human life on earth. The agricultural revolution brought the first great separation. With the dawning of agriculture, the tendency was to see the other things of the earth as resources to be exploited rather than fellow living beings or a sacred trust to be revered and protected. By tilling the land and domesticating animals, humans were able to lessen their dependence on the bounty or scarcity of nature. Perhaps most important, in their separation from other things of nature there was a sense of independence from God’s creation and thus a sense of separateness from God.

The second great separation followed the industrial revolution. The separation of people into farmers and non-farmers actually began with the early enclosure movement during the 1600s.  Prior to the enclosures, land was held in common for public use, not owned by individuals. Land was freely available to everyone to use to met their basic needs of survival and sustenance. In a sense, every family was a farm family. They meet their needs for food by cultivating the commons. Wholesale enclosures during the period from 1760 and 1820 meant that people lost their right to use common land to produce food, in village after village all across Europe.

The industrial revolution and rise of capitalism also occurred during this time. Adam Smith wrote his landmark book, The Wealth of Nations, in 1776. Land was privatized so the most efficient use of land could be determined by market competition rather than community consensus. Labor then also had to be “commodified,” or bought and sold, so non-farmers could work for wages and buy food and the other necessities of life they had been getting from the land. With reliance on working for wages, buying, and selling the necessity for personal relationships were diminished.

With the diminished necessity for personal relationships, the social cohesion within families, communities, and society began to diminish as well. The persistence of chronic poverty and malnutrition, even during times of tremendous economic growth and individual wealth, are direct consequences of a growing sense of disconnectedness from each other that was nourished by the industrial era of economic development.

The third great separation was the industrial agricultural revolution.  Until well into 1900s, farming remained a means of feeling some sense of connection with the earth. When I was growing up on a small farm in the 1940s and 1950s, rural communities were interwoven networks of people who knew each other mainly out of necessity. Farming was a community affair, by necessity. Nearly everyone in the U.S. lived on a farm, had lived on a farm, or knew someone who lived on a farm. There was still a sense of connectedness to the land, the earth, through food and farming. But “times changed” in rural America. The industrialization of agriculture removed the necessity for community-based farming.

Farmers eventually lost their sense of connectedness to their land, to each other, and to their communities. Consumers no longer know who produces their food, where it was produced, or how it was produced. What happens to food between the earth and the eater has become largely a mystery. Food for family gatherings and religious holidays are of economic importance to the food industry but have little social or spiritual significance beyond following cultural traditions. The dependence of humanity on the earth for food is no less than during the early times of hunting and gathering, but the sense of connectedness between the eater and the earth has been lost.

The plight of rural America is succinctly summarized in a recent letter to the book editor of the New York Times by Wendell Berry—farmer, philosopher, and gifted author: “The business of America has been largely and without apology the plundering of rural America, from which everything of value—minerals, timber, farm animals, farm crops, and “labor”—has been taken at the lowest possible price. As apparently none of the enlightened ones has seen in flying over or bypassing on the interstate highways, its too-large fields are toxic and eroding, its streams and rivers poisoned, its forests mangled, its towns dying or dead along with their locally owned small businesses, its children leaving after high school and not coming back. Too many of the children are not working at anything, too many are transfixed by the various screens, too many are on drugs, too many are dying.”[i]

What’s happening in rural America is a microcosm of what’s happening all across America, in urban as well as rural areas, and all around the world.  David Korten cites compelling evidence of economic inequity and decline, natural resource depletion, global climate change, social divisions and wars, and mass extinction of species.[ii]  We are confronted with an ecological, social, and spiritual crisis arising from our lost sense on interconnectedness with each other and with the earth—the three great separations.

From the wisdom of Pope Francis: “We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental.” [iii] He identifies an increasingly myopic preoccupation with economic self-interest as the root cause of this crisis. He writes, “Human life is grounded in three fundamental and closely intertwined relationships: with God, with our neighbour and with the earth itself.” “Everything is interconnected, and that genuine care for our own lives and our relationships with nature is inseparable from fraternity, justice and faithfulness to others.” Reconnecting with each other and with the earth is no longer a matter of choice, it is a matter of absolute necessity.

[i] Wendell Berry, “Southern Despair,” New Your Times Review of Books, Reply to Nathaniel Rich, http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/05/11/southern-despair/ .

[ii] David Korten, The Great Turning; From Empire to Earth Community, (Sterling, VA; Kumarian Press, 2006), 251.

[iii] Pope Francis, Encyclical Letter, Laudato Si, Care of our Common Home, paras, 139, 66, & 70. http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html

Clean Up, Or The Environment Will Clean Us Out!

Clean Up, Or The Environment Will Clean Us Out!

Ashish Joseph | TNN | April 21, 2018

Times of India

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What will happen to Chennai’s topography 10 years hence? Will we lose our green cover? Will the sea level rise and submerge Chennai? What about pollution? Agricultureand environment? Experts paint a bleak picture, unless we take up cudgels and do something drastic to save the city… with some even hinting at the possible introduction of oxygen cylinder stations, on the lines of bus stops, in the city by 2028, to let us breathe in the required amount of oxygen to survive… loss of flora and fauna, and more… But our agriculturists are looking ahead, hoping 2028 would bring more technology into this sector.

The future is going to be bleak, unless we commit to change

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Says environmentalist Nityanand Jayaraman, “I am not talking only about environment. It is not a standalone issue. Environment cuts across various aspects that decide whether or not life can be sustained in the city. I don’t know if 10 years is enough to kill the city, but at least, there will be irreversible damage if things go as it is now. If the second scenario is where things are little more aggressive, well, in another 10 years, we will have a dead city. What I mean is, economy would have collapsed, and instead of planned downsizing of the city, we’ll have a crash downsizing. By doing what we have been doing in a more aggressive way, which is what we’re planning to do with the expanded Chennai city, the city would have ended its life as a dynamic place and economic powerhouse even before that nightmare of expanded city becomes a reality. The third one is the good-news scenario, where we develop a commitment and do something to heal the environment, especially by reducing the inflow of people into the city and making other places of Tamil Nadu attractive as places of habitation, work, etc. Also, we need to have defined policies on solid waste management, sewage, water harvesting/conservation and zero tolerance to encroachments of waterbodies and coastal areas. In that case, we will be able to repair most of the damage and move towards being a pretty cool city.”

We will have to use oxygen stations
 

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To a great extent, the reason for many fatal diseases these days is because of the lack of oxygen. So, what we need is enough green cover for good oxygen supply, says green crusader, K Abdul Ghani. “Any city needs to have 33.3% green cover. But Chennai has only 6% green cover. A decade from now, if things continue to be the same, the city’s green cover would have depleted further. We’d have come to a stage where we will have to use oxygen stations just like how people are using in China these days; we will have to pay for oxygen, too. Now, we’re fighting for water, soon we will be fighting for fresh air. And what’s next stage of drought? It’s acid rain. That’s impending.”

Chennai will become a global model

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Due to recent natural calamities, everybody in Chennai is aware of what nature is capable of. So, there’s a lot of positive energy in Chennai about how we can participate to resurrect the city from its current environmental mire, says Arun Krishnamurthy, founder, Environmentalist Foundation of India. “But the question is, will Chennai translate its positive energy into action? If it does, we will be the water capital of the world in 10 years. We’re a city of three rivers, 300-plus lakes, a large marshland and a fine coast. There’s no other city with such water intensity. What Chennai does with her experience and knowledge to safeguard its water resources can become a global model. And if we don’t do it, then, too, we would have become a model for other cities. So, what happens in Chennai in the next decade will have a global impact.”

We would have optimised waste water management
 

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Professor Sudhir Chella Rajan, Project Scientist at Indo-German Centre for Sustainability (IGCS) who also teaches Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at IIT Madras says, “Chennai would have integrated transport planning with land-use planning. Existing and new areas of the city would have been built around high density, diversity of land-uses and destination accessibility involving plenty of opportunity for using non-motorised modes such as walking and cycling, while vastly improving the efficiency and scope of bus infrastructure while expanding other public transit networks such as the Metro and BRTS, he says, and adds, “Water and wastewater management would have improved through the expanded use of decentralised neighbourhood-scale technologies that emphasise the usage of recycled water, and we would be generating value from waste, using low levels of energy. And hopefully, we would have in place, land-use planning and management strategies for expanding biodiversity regions, maintaining water bodies, protecting the shoreline and river channels.”

We would have an all-inclusive wildlife policy
 

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Wildlife researchers, however, do not see a bright future for the city. “I don’t want to be pessimistic about the scenario 10 years from now. But we have already lost quite a few species; several others have been displaced. Fresh water aquatic fauna are the most threatened, especially, the fauna of our rivers. We have so little information on them, that we do not know how much we have lost,” says Hopeland P, wildlife researcher and consultant. He adds, “We would have hopefully drawn up a plan to safe keep wildlife and encourage more private entities like apartment complexes, community blocks and corporates to work in this direction.”

People’s attitude would have changed
 

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D Suresh, popularly known as Solar Suresh, tells us, “Awareness has been increasing, but that hasn’t translated into implementation and execution. In the next decade I hope to see people’s attitude change, even though I don’t expect to see a dramatic change, I do expect all of us, the government and the people, to find a solution.” “I have done about 20 biogas installations, 40 solar installations, 15 terrace kitchen gardens out of 3,000 enquiries. The government should also step in to give helping hands by creating awareness, giving recognition to people who are involved into this,” he adds.

We will go back to the villages

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Athher Ahmed, former IT professional and founder of Chennai Urban Farms, a trending Facebook page, opines, “I am very positive about it; grow your own food would have caught on as a concept in the next decade. And agriculture would see revolutionary changes — I see drone playing an important role in soil and field analysis, planting systems, decreasing costs by 85 percent. Dronescan also is used for crop monitoring and assessment of crop health, aid disease management, and yield.” He also adds that a decade later, he sees more and more people moving back to the villages and adapting to agriculture. “Today people visit their farmhouses on weekends and holidays, but it is going to reverse a decade later, apartments in cities will become a place to visit on weekends and farmhouses will be places to live in.”

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Pollution control measures would be in place

The main contribution to air pollution comes from the increasing number of personal vehicles, say the officials from the Pollution Control Board (PCB). “We can generate more awareness, provide better public transport so that people use public transportation, and also maintain the health of their personal vehicles,” says a PCB official. “But air-pollution will be minimised, because we are contemplating strict measures. We are also in talks to ban vehicles that are more than 15 years old,” he adds.

WISH LIST FOR THE FUTURE

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Chinmayi, singer

1. Reclaim Adyar River and stop dumping garbage into it
2. Increase the green cover of the city
3. Install solar panels in every apartment
4. Lead a lifestyle that's gentle on the environment
5. Reclaim our lakes and remove encroachments from the Pallikaranai marshland
6. Dig compost pits in apartments

-Ashish.Joseph1@timesgroup.com and Purnima.Sah@timesgroup.com

Pure Flavor® - IFCO Partnership Ensures Year-Round Delivery of Quality Fresh Produce Across North America

Pure Flavor® - IFCO Partnership Ensures Year-Round Delivery of Quality Fresh Produce Across North America

Use of Shared and Reusable “Smart Packaging” Maximizes Operational Efficiency

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Tampa, Florida (February 27, 2018) -  Pure Flavor®’s use of IFCO Reusable Plastic Containers (RPCs) has had a positive impact for the Leamington, Ontario-based, a vertically integrated provider of a wide variety of fresh produce products year-round to retailers across North America. After six years of collaboration, Pure Flavor®’s use of IFCO RPCs has continued to grow rapidly to include packaging for a wide range of products, including tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and eggplants.

“IFCO is a valuable partner,” said Jason Veno, Packaging Operations Manager for Pure Flavor®. “Not only do they provide us with ‘smart packaging’ that protects and cools our products extremely well, they maximize our operational efficiency by ensuring we have an adequate supply of RPCs year-round, even during peak growing seasons. That predictability means we can continue to serve our customers and their shoppers efficiently, effectively and on time”, said Veno.

IFCO now provides Pure Flavor® with over one million RPCs annually. They are used to package fresh produce at locations in San Antonio, Texas, Romulus, Michigan, and Leamington, Ontario, and are then shipped to retailers throughout the U.S. and Canada.

“IFCO’s partnership with Pure Flavor® is based on thoughtful collaboration and the shared goal of providing consumers with a constant supply of high quality, safe, nutritious and affordable produce each- and every- day,” said Daniel Walsh, President, IFCO North America. “Our RPCs are tailor-made for growers like Pure Flavor® that want the best possible efficiency and sustainability for their packaging, and we are proud to work side-by-side with such a visionary company. We are also proud of our presence and expansion in the Canadian marketplace, as well as the supporting infrastructure we have established there to better serve our many Canadian customers.”

IFCO and Pure Flavor® have developed a forecasting model that tracks the company’s produce orders and growing seasons and ensures on-time delivery of the right number and type of RPCs throughout the year. In addition, some RPCs are stored on-site, providing the Pure Flavor® operations group with greater flexibility to manage its product flow.

Ongoing collaboration between Pure Flavor® and IFCO will continue to optimize supply chain operations, as well as reduce the companies’ environmental footprint in the months and years ahead.

IFCO and Pure Flavor® will be exhibiting at the upcoming Southern Exposure Convention & Trade Show in Tampa, FL on March 3rd. IFCO will be located at Booth #120. Pure Flavor® will be located at Booth #605. Retail partners are encouraged to stop by the Pure Flavor® booth to learn more about the company’s greenhouse vegetable products as well as the expansion to Georgia with a new 75-acre high tech greenhouse facility.

Additional information -

Pure Flavor® is a family of greenhouse vegetable growers who share a commitment to bringing A Life of Pure Flavor™ to communities everywhere. Our passion for sustainable greenhouse growing, strong support for our retail & foodservice customers, and focus on engaging consumers is built on a foundation drawn from generations of growing expertise. We are the next generation of vegetable growers, inspired to put quality, flavor, and customers first by providing greenhouse-grown vegetables from our farms that are strategically located throughout North America.  http://www.pure-flavor.com/

IFCO is the leading global provider of reusable packaging solutions for fresh foods, serving customers in 50+ countries. IFCO operates a pool of over 290 million Reusable Plastic Containers (RPCs) globally, which are used for over 1.4 billion shipments of fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, bread, and other items from suppliers to grocery retailers every year. IFCO RPCs ensure a better fresh food supply chain by protecting freshness and quality and lowering costs, food waste and environmental impact compared to single-use packaging. IFCO is a Brambles Company. www.ifco.com.

Fertinnowa Develops Water Book

Fertinnowa Develops Water Book

The Fertigation Bible has been prepared to provide useful practical information to the horticultural sector of the diverse technologies available for all aspects of fertigation within the EU. The various stages of the “fertigation process” are shown in the schematic representation below. The Fertigation Bible contains descriptions of the technologies related to these stages.

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• Each technology is described in terms of:

• Purpose/aim of the technology
• Regions, crops and cropping systems where it is used
• Working principle of operation
• Operational conditions
• Cost data
• Benefits for the grower – advantages and disadvantages
• Technological, socio-economic and regulatory bottlenecks and limitations
• Techniques resulting from this technology
• Supporting systems required
• Development, i.e. if it is in a research or development stage, or has been commercialized
• Who provides the technology

A total of 125 such technology descriptions are provided.

Considerable effort was made to ensure that the Fertigation Bible is as comprehensive as possible. Various members of the FERTINNOWA project, from 23 organisations from 10 countries, have worked on this document to describe the most commonly-used and promising technologies that are commercially available or are expected to be so in the near future.

You can download the Fertigation Bible here.
 

Publication date: 3/26/2018