There are many benefits to indoor vertical farming including reducing environmental stress, economic prosperity, and the creation of a system that can provide local produce year round. With all these benefits, you may be curious to why more growing hasn’t moved indoors? What are the challenges behind these new types of farming? And are solutions being found to make it easier – more feasible? Here is what I have found.
Start Up Costs
The first challenge for any company wanting to start an indoor farm is the startup costs. For companies looking to take part in indoor farming, there are hefty capital expenditures such as real estate and equipment as well as ongoing high operating costs for electricity etc.
Complexity of Lighting
One of the more prominent reasons the indoor farming industry has expanded in the last several years is due to the falling price of light emitting diode (LED) lights. LED lighting provides the same amount of lighting as fluorescent light but requires half the amount of energy. There is a lot of research into studies about the interaction between crops and the light spectrum. Horticultural lighting is complex. Plants react uniquely to different spectrum of light and color at different points in their growing cycle. There is ongoing extensive research and data collection to make indoor farming economically viable and energy efficient.
Crop Range
You could pretty much grow anything in an indoor vertical farm. Indoor vertical farming may be the future for leafy greens, medical plants and herbs. Indoor farming plays a specific role in the future of farming, Each indoor farm, greenhouse, or warehouse, is engineered for a specific crop including the lighting, climate, nutrition, irrigation, software, and sensors for that particular growing environment.
The key to reducing plant disease and pests isAIRFLOW.
In an indoor growing environment, humidity is naturally produced from plants transpiring and irrigation water evaporating in combination with heat produced by the LED lights. Humidity creates a favourable environment for human and plant pathogen growth. Airflow systems pump CO2 in for plant respiration and remove excess humidity. Effective airflow is difficult in horizontal plane vertical farming due to the limited space between the crop’s canopy and lighting fixtures. This lack of space for adequate airflow results in a higher risk of food borne pathogens as well as higher energy cost to aggressively pump more CO2 and air through the growing chambers. Add to this the fact that most indoor environments are kept exceptionally clean – almost sterile.
Bottom Line
The indoor farming industry undoubtedly has benefits, but it is not without its challenges. With the rapid advancement of technology and new research focused on improving indoor crop production, indoor farming can become more affordable, overcome hefty electric bills, improve food safety, expand crop range, and increase peoples’ knowledge of the industry. Keep your eyes on indoor farming.
Factors | Challenges | GrowSpec Solution |
Labor | Increase cost and lack of availability | Our system is automatic save your labour up-to 70% |
Natural Resources | Increase cost and lack of reliability | GROWSPEC systems save your water and nutrition 80-90%, power up-to 50% |
Capital Intensive Technology | Climate management | Airflow,humidity,temperature of nutrients,co2 fully controlled |
Access to Capital | Limited funding sources | Every system work independently can start at small scale and expand gradually |
Access to Data | Complicate works | The system is intelligent, just input your grow data it will follow your instructions and give you consistent output. |
Profitability/Yield | Yields/m2/$ drive profit | Our system give you 30% higher production and 1 week faster than conventional system |
Crop types | New environments = new crop types | Multi type of plants can grow in our system for example CBD, Hemp,Basil,Tomato etc |
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