More than ten years ago I learned about a professor at Columbia University who was developing an idea with his students to grow crops in urban buildings. Every futuristic idea needs a cool name, and Dr. Dickson Despommier and his students came up with “Vertical Farming” and created a website. It was one of those thought experiments that only a cranky professor and his ingenuous students could seriously consider – plus one excitable freelance journalist. I pitched the story for a couple of years – one publication rejected it saying, “we already covered green roofs” – until it landed in New York magazine and went insanely viral.
Years later, it’s not a crazy idea anymore. While there aren’t any skyscrapers dedicated to agriculture yet, indoor farming has evolved from a few hydroponic greenhouses to acres of vertical crops growing inside adaptively reused buildings. The most promising advances come from a consortium of Dutch engineers, called PlantLab, who have developed the technology to optimize plant growth in a purpose-built setting. The Dutch engineers claim (and who doesn’t trust a Dutch engineer?) they are growin
g plants — without genetic modification or chemicals — that need 10 percent of the water typically used in farming, with yields 2 to 3 times higher than a greenhouse and 30 to 40 times higher than a traditional farm. Having already built a fully functioning prototype in 2010, PlantLab says they can construct customizable “plant production units” (PPUs) to fit everything from a basement corner to a skyscraper. You can even control the PPU remotely.
Of course PlantLab has a TED Talk that is definitely worth watching. Hearing about how creating a “plant paradise” can optimize plant/vegetable growth is fascinating, but the most important point is that they can deploy this technology today. California might want to look into it ASAP.