Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots • Hacker News Board

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#141

Post by foolmeonce » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:17 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #67

user568439 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- 250x less water - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop - Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs - Saving the cost of SCM (transport and intermediaries) which is sometimes much bigger than producing. In farming is actually a…

1. How many of these points can be achieved, and to what relative quality, with greenhouses? 2. Given sunlight is ~1 gigawatt per square kilometre, and given the light level plants need, to the extent that this allows winter production of: (a) staple crops such as wheat, rice, potatoes: this will need implementation of all the improvements to the global power grid that eco-optimists like me call for and which eco-pes…

I would generally agree, but I see solving the problems caused by "cash crops" as very good and not unlike solar and wind solving the problems of extremes first.

If it can replace the 5% of food that is currently handled terribly and has an enormously oversized footprint then that is great.

I am not horrified by the ramifications of my staple rice coming from Asia on a slow boat which I then consume 100% of. I am horrified by all the trozical fruits that are being airmailed and then largely discarded.

Once they are done experimenting, they will want to focus on what pays best and whether they mean to or not, they will be replacing terrible with better, while still not competing on very low cost/resource staple food.

I think there's no reason we can't eventually really beat plants on achieving higher density resource usage given seasons, light spectrum conversation, wind, etc, but it is a mistake to focus on how far off that is as a reason not to begin the process.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#142

Post by brnt » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:18 PM UTC

bryanlarsen wrote: post #138

user568439 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- 250x less water - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop - Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs - Saving the cost of SCM (transport and intermediaries) which is sometimes much bigger than producing. In farming is actually a…

KaiserPro had good rebuttals to some of your points[1] so I won't repeat those, but here are some more: > - 250x less water Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0. > transport Bulk transport is incredibly efficient. IIRC, many food products spend…

> I recall another study showing that it was more carbon efficient buying frozen mutton from New Zealand in London than it was buying local fresh mutton.

I wouldn't mind seeing that calculation!

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#143

Post by foolmeonce » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:19 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #67

user568439 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- 250x less water - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop - Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs - Saving the cost of SCM (transport and intermediaries) which is sometimes much bigger than producing. In farming is actually a…

1. How many of these points can be achieved, and to what relative quality, with greenhouses? 2. Given sunlight is ~1 gigawatt per square kilometre, and given the light level plants need, to the extent that this allows winter production of: (a) staple crops such as wheat, rice, potatoes: this will need implementation of all the improvements to the global power grid that eco-optimists like me call for and which eco-pes…

I would generally agree, but I see solving the problems caused by "cash crops" as very good and not unlike solar and wind solving the problems of extremes first.

If it can replace the 5% of food that is currently handled terribly and has an enormously oversized footprint then that is great.

I am not horrified by the ramifications of my staple rice coming from Asia on a slow boat which I then consume 100% of. I am horrified by all the tropical fruits that are being air-mailed and then largely discarded.

Once they are done experimenting, they will want to focus on what pays best and whether they mean to or not, they will be replacing terrible with better, while still not competing on very low cost/resource staple food.

I think there's no reason we can't eventually really beat plants on achieving higher density resource usage given seasons, light spectrum conversation, wind, etc, but it is a mistake to focus on how far off that is as a reason not to begin the process.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#144

Post by brnt » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

universa1 wrote: post #66

KaiserPro wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop yes, but you are spending money and carbon on re-creating sunlight. > Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs Monocultures are spectacularly fragile. You have to be extraordinarily care…

> What agriculture really needs is an effective way to make and keep decent soil. Growing up on a farm in Germany, this is just what I would call decent farming and this is not rocket science. The knowledge how to do this is there and imho it does not involve some "tech disruption". Agriculture, at least in Germany, is highly mechanized/technized and in the end it does not matter if you look at conventional/"industri…

I don't know how different Germany is, but here in the Netherlands, it's hard to find farmers who understand what good soil and the meaning of an ecosystem is. They are, apart from a few, industrialists operating a biotech factory for which they've learned the 'recipe' for growing and selling particular crops or livestock.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#145

Post by Retric » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

sauwan wrote: post #139

theferalrobot wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 250x less water Compared to what exactly and for what crop? Rain is free and is all that is needed for plenty of crops

Have you ever seen how we do conventional agriculture these days?

Yep, irrigation is location dependent as annual rainfall varies a lot. New Orleans, Louisiana gets 62 inches of rain per year where Las Vegas gets 4. In many areas water conservation is mostly pointless.

Indoor farming needs to irritate 100% of their needs so they can actually need more irrigation than farms in other areas.

PS: Hawaii is really interesting as it varies so much. With some areas seeing over 25 feet of rain per year. http://rainfall.geography.hawaii.edu/rainfall.html

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#146

Post by KaiserPro » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:23 PM UTC

universa1 wrote: post #66

KaiserPro wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop yes, but you are spending money and carbon on re-creating sunlight. > Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs Monocultures are spectacularly fragile. You have to be extraordinarily care…

> What agriculture really needs is an effective way to make and keep decent soil. Growing up on a farm in Germany, this is just what I would call decent farming and this is not rocket science. The knowledge how to do this is there and imho it does not involve some "tech disruption". Agriculture, at least in Germany, is highly mechanized/technized and in the end it does not matter if you look at conventional/"industri…

100%

I grew up going to a museum that had a historical farm every weekend (17th-early 19th century) Spreading liquid cow poop on the field wasn't an option because they didn't have the machinery. So they needed to do animal/crop rotation to keep the costs down (ie not pay for animal food.)

When I wasn't there I was on my parent's allotment. Next to the allotment was a standard arable field. For various reasons It stopped being used and was left to nature.

Two things struck me: 1) it was about 80cm lower than the allotments

2) nothing grew on it. The strip of land that served as a border had to be mown _every week_ to keep it from exploding.

It had basically degraded to sand and stone.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#147

Post by bryanlarsen » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:23 PM UTC

brnt wrote: post #142

bryanlarsen wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

KaiserPro had good rebuttals to some of your points[1] so I won't repeat those, but here are some more: > - 250x less water Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0. > transport Bulk transport is incredibly efficient. IIRC, many food products spend…

> I recall another study showing that it was more carbon efficient buying frozen mutton from New Zealand in London than it was buying local fresh mutton. I wouldn't mind seeing that calculation!

> The research showed that for each tonne of NZ lamb produced and imported, 688kg of CO2 is emitted. When compared to the 2849.1kg of CO2 emitted in UK production, the most sustainable lamb would appear to be that from NZ.

https://www.ecoandbeyond.co/articles/british-new-zealand-lam...

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#148

Post by kitd » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:26 PM UTC

bryanlarsen wrote: post #138

user568439 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- 250x less water - Sun/heat/light maybe needs to be converted but it's always used in the right amount for each crop - Controlled environments protected from plagues, floods, fires... Crops are not lost due to uncontrollable events and a lot of savings in chemicals to protect them from bugs - Saving the cost of SCM (transport and intermediaries) which is sometimes much bigger than producing. In farming is actually a…

KaiserPro had good rebuttals to some of your points[1] so I won't repeat those, but here are some more: > - 250x less water Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0. > transport Bulk transport is incredibly efficient. IIRC, many food products spend…

Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0.

A few days ago there was a post here about water now being traded as a commodity.

In many parts of the world, the water supply is far from guaranteed and must be shared with the local environment, population and other farmers. Using 1/250 of the water otherwise supplied by rain is pretty compelling.

And that's without the arguments about reducing the need for pesticides and fertilisers.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#149

Post by bryanlarsen » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:34 PM UTC

kitd wrote: post #148

bryanlarsen wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

KaiserPro had good rebuttals to some of your points[1] so I won't repeat those, but here are some more: > - 250x less water Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0. > transport Bulk transport is incredibly efficient. IIRC, many food products spend…

Most crops are grown with this thing called "rain" and without any supplemental water. Using just rain means they are part of the natural transpiration and precipitation cycle, so their unnatural water usage is 0. A few days ago there was a post here about water now being traded as a commodity. In many parts of the world, the water supply is far from guaranteed and must be shared with the local environment, populatio…

Plants don't destroy water, they store, move and clean it.

Re: Europe's Biggest Vertical Farm Will Be Powered by Wind and Planted by Robots

#150

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Dec 14, 2020, 2:37 PM UTC

patall wrote: post #111

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Salads are economic to produce because they have no calories. Calories = Light (energy) + Fertiliser. Efficiency of an LED is like 40%, and Photosynthesis efficiency is like 2%. In other words calories are expensive and ineffieicent to produce through artificial lighting, no amount of 'startuping' will change that. Also nothing here is new, we've had greenhouses, artificial lighting, hydroponics, aquaponics, aeroponi…

While your premise is probably right, note that the 2% efficiency of photosynthesis is for sun light. Growth lamps such used here will certainly emit at wave length optimized to the absorption spectra of the crop.

[deleted]