Welcome to the future of farming, where herbs, salads and soft fruits are grown year-round in huge indoor plant factories. In June, British vertical farming startup Jones Food Company (JFCo) announced it was building the world’s largest vertical farm on the site of an old factory in Lydney, Gloucestershire. Its chief executive, James Lloyd-Jones, predicts that within 10 years the UK could be growing all its herbs, salad leaves, soft fruit – and potentially cut flowers – this way: “Vertical farms will become the norm in the supply chain and possibly remove greenhouse production and imports.” The seeds of this revolution are being sown – in vertically stacked layers of sheep’s wool – at JFCo’s innovation center in Bristol. Lloyd-Jones said: “Vertical farming can grow anything. It just grows a lot of things that are too expensive to be commercially viable, so this is where we learn how to commercialize it.” In the first of four 69 square meter growing rooms are piles of bright green chives. Every environmental parameter in the room is tightly controlled, from the temperature, humidity and carbon dioxide content of the room, to the color spectrum, intensity and pattern of the light-dark cycle, and the nutrients the seedlings are exposed to. By adjusting these parameters and experimenting with different plant varieties, they investigate the optimal conditions for growing these herbs. “You remove the need for sunlight and create every environmental parameter perfect for the plants’ needs. You give them their best time – basically, two weeks in Barbados, where they come back relaxed – and then you pick them up,” Lloyd-Jones said. It’s easy to spot which seedlings have hit the jackpot: some of the trays contain lush green carpets of chives. other episodic eruptions. Down the corridor, similar experiments are being done with coriander and dill, while a 276m2 strawberry laboratory is being built along the corridor. Farming this way could have many advantages. “One of the big benefits is that we grow in a way that doesn’t impact nature,” said Charlie Guy, co-founder of LettUs Grow, a Bristol-based company developing technology for vertical farms. “It also means we can focus more of our land on things like tree planting. So, from a biodiversity point of view, there are huge benefits.” Because the nutrient-rich water that bathes the plant roots is cleaned and reused up to 30 times, there is less waste. There’s also no pesticide runoff into nearby waterways, and no herbicides or pesticides are needed because the plants are indoors. Stacking plants on top of each other on shelves and growing them in consistent and optimized conditions, 365 days a year, also means that, in theory, every square meter of land is more productive, compared to conventional farms. Another advantage is the consistency in the product itself. “Vertical growing allows you to grow things with a very consistent look and taste, which means they can be packaged more efficiently and there’s less waste because fewer of the items are unattractive to supermarket shoppers,” Professor Antony Dodd said in John Innes Centre. , a research center in Norwich. Even so, as of 2020, only about 30 hectares (75 acres) of functional vertical farming land existed worldwide. A key challenge is that growing crops indoors 24/7 requires a lot of electricity – to power lights, heaters, humidifiers and other equipment. Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you to the top stories and what they mean, free every weekday morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising and content sponsored by external parties. For more information, see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. JFCo’s solution is to invest in renewable energy: The roof of its farm in Lydney – which will eventually provide 1.5 hectares of growing space (equivalent to about 60 tennis courts) – will be covered entirely by solar panels, with space for further panels or wind turbine on neighboring land. Guy said: “Energy is always an issue with vertical farms, but when you couple it with renewable energy then it’s really a very sustainable way of growing food, versus importing it from all over the world and the risk issues of sustainability and the supply chain. are associated with it’. A vertical farm in West Java, Indonesia. Photo: Dasril Roszandi/NurPhoto/REX/Shutterstock To further boost productivity, LettUs Grow develops aeroponic growing methods, which involve spraying the plant’s roots with a very fine mist of nutrient solution, rather than placing them in it (hydroponics). If plants have healthy roots, they will be able to use energy more efficiently and grow much better. A good analogy is, “if you think about a nice healthy soil, it’s got lots of air pockets, it’s got the right amount of nutrients, the right amount of moisture – we can effectively recreate that using aeroponics,” Guy said. Even if these plant pioneers can make vertical farming cost-effective, it is unlikely to replace traditional farming for staple crops such as wheat, rice or potatoes. These have a longer growing season and require a lot of light, compared to herbs or salad leaves. “A field of wheat also doesn’t sell for as much money as a field of lettuce. There’s a sweet spot in terms of the speed at which things grow and the amount of energy that needs to go into the system for these facilities to be economically viable,” Dodd said. Where vertical farming could be viable is for crops with shorter growing seasons such as salad leaves, herbs and soft fruits such as strawberries or blueberries. “It’s not the answer to food security, but it’s one of a number of different things that can help produce food more sustainably,” Dodd said.
