What would urban agriculture look like if it were industrialized? Everything on this site approaches urban agriculture from an ecological perspective. As urban agriculture becomes more popular, we find entrepreneurs looking at opportunities in the field. Some of those entrepreneurs will follow the current trends towards local, sustainable agriculture. But, others will see the opportunities and approach urban agriculture from the industrial approach. What will their agriculture look like?
We can take a guess by looking first at existing non-urban industrial agriculture. It is characterized as:
- Capital intensive, energy intensive, and highly automated (ie, not labor intensive). This is typically described as productive when measured on an output per unit of labor or an output per acre basis.
- Based on reductionist sciences, not systems sciences. That is, it uses monocropping to produce a single output given a set of inputs and does not use integrated plant or plant/animal cropping systems (polycropping). It is not concerned about systemic level ecological or human relationships that are part of the food chain.
- Uses industrially produced chemicals, such as fertilizers and pesticides.
- Large scale (ie, not human know-your-local-farmer scale).
- Subsidized by taxpayers via regulations that favor factory farms, cheap water from government projects or direct subsidies.
- Marketed with hyperbole about how its alleged benefits will save the world from environmental catastrophe and/or future increases in population, while ignoring or downplaying its problems.
When we look at current proposals for urban agriculture, there is one set of proposals that fits the above characteristics. These proposals are focused around intensive production using hydroponics. Hydroponics has been around for quite a while, but large-scale proposals have been popping up in the past few years, more frequently as urban agriculture (and the trends towards local and sustainable agriculture) have accelerated.
First, some background. Hydroponics is a technology that grows plants in water-based nutrient solutions instead of soil. It is well-documented that hydroponics is a highly productive method of growing plants. For maximum production, hydroponic techniques require highly controlled growing conditions, controlling temperature, humidity and lighting. Because of this, hydroponics is almost always practiced indoors. These highly controlled conditions allow production to be done year-round. Hydroponic operations can recycle water, so they offer the benefit of efficient water usage. Hydroponics is by no means, however, ecological. As generally practiced, it requires industrial chemicals and large capital outlays for equipment to maintain necessary growing conditions. It does not integrate with local ecosystems, but excludes them to create its own closed system.
The first article I saw proposing large-scale urban hydroponics was a theoretical proposal in the Science section of the New York Times, in July 2008. The article presented the possibility of “vertical farms” powered by alternative energy (wind and solar). The article was short on economic and production details and heavy on “pie-in-the-sky” speculation. The estimates provided, however, are suggestive. Professor Dickson Despommier, of Columbia University, believed that a 30-story vertical farm capable of feeding 50,000 people would cost in the hundreds of millions of dollars to build. Despommier acknowledged that this idea needs more research
By August 2009, just 13 months later, the topic had moved to the Op-Ed pages of the Times. No longer being interviewed, the piece was written by Professor Despommier. He was forthright in disclosing that he has a financial stake in vertical farms, since he has started a company to build them. So, it isn’t surprising that the piece was typically Op-Ed, opening with the assertion that
If climate change and population growth progress at their current pace, in roughly 50 years farming as we know it will no longer exist. This means that the majority of people could soon be without enough food or water. But there is a solution that is surprisingly within reach: Move most farming into cities, and grow crops in tall, specially constructed buildings. It’s called vertical farming.
That’s certainly attention-getting. After a little finger-pointing at climate change, topsoil loss, voluminous water use and polluted runoff in traditional agriculture, and expected population growth, he moves on to the hard sell. Sky-scraper agriculture will save us all, especially if we live where water is in short supply.
He claims that “Vertical farms are now feasible, in large part because of a robust global greenhouse initiative that has enjoyed considerable commercial success over the last 10 years.” It’s unclear what this means or what it has to do with vertical farms. He also claims that vertical farms would “revolutionize and improve urban life,” but doesn’t explain how. In a flash of Arcadian vision, he claims that vertical farms would also “revitalize land that was damaged by traditional farming.” Farms would be abandoned as every indoor farming acre replaced 10-20 acres of existing farmland, which would revert to a natural ecological state. Vertical farms would act as ecosystems by recycling waste and water.
The availability of fresh food would improve diets and reduce Type II diabetes and obesity. Reduced transportation costs would reduce fossil fuel use. Crops damaged by weather would be a thing of the past. Pollution from agricultural runoff would end. Jobs would be created. Buildings would be “things of beauty and grace.” There would be less carbon dioxide and more oxygen in the air. Gawd, what’s not to like? (I did warn you of the marketing hyperbole in these proposals!)
Finally, he gets to the main point. In order to prove that this concept works, he needs money. In particular, he needs a massive handout from the City of New York to build a prototype. Once the prototype (subsidized by taxpayers, of course) demonstrates the economic viability of high-rise agriculture, venture capitalists will rush into the market. Apparently, however, the benefits aren’t so obvious that private investors are willing to risk their capital on the prototype. Venture capitalists will take risks, but they’re not stupid.
Looking at this proposal, we see that it meets all the above criteria for industrialized agriculture. A more critical look would raise some key questions that might explain the dearth of private capital. The proposed systems are heavily energy-dependent, so I’ll focus on energy, although other issues could be raised. Protecting crops from the weather in high-rise buildings and producing food year-round would require massive investments of energy to construct the buildings and the internal production systems. Operationally, temperatures would have to be maintained at crop-determined levels, ie, heating in the winter and cooling in the summer. We already know that commercial buildings are massive users of energy, so maintaining the proposed vertical farms would have similar energy requirements. (What would happen, incidentally, to the crops–not to mention the people dependent upon them–when a major power outage occured? The requisite backup systems to prevent total crop loss would likely be prohibitively expensive.) Finally, energy costs associated with the production and transport of industrial chemicals used in hydroponic operations need to be considered.
I am, to say the least, skeptical. Most of the proposals I’ve seen so far appear to be sky-scraping pies in the sky. That’s not to say that large-scale hydrop0nic operations won’t find a place. But, that place is likely to be a small, niche market, where such projects have particular benefits dovetailing with local factors. In particular, in locations where temperatures are moderate year-round and water is in short supply, the energy requirements for structures would be low and savings in water would be valuable.
I do believe we need more experimentation with these systems. Although they are definitely industrial and not ecological, the lines between the two systems can and will be blurred, with some features of sustainable systems moderating the negative features of hydroponic systems. Basically, we’re in the process of reinventing urban agriculture and we need to experiment wildly to find ways of producing food in cities in ways that are sustainable. It’s possible that hybrid systems will be developed for economic and/or ecological reasons, depending on local circumstances.
For example, aquaponics is similar to hydroponics, but instead of industrial chemicals, it uses waste from fish to grow food, providing both plant and animal products. (Of course, where does the fish food come from?) See this discussion of a possible commercial aquaponics operation. A recent New York Times blog post discussed a variety of urban agriculture developments taking place, including a hydroponics production test facility on the Hudson River that uses alternative energy sources. A fellow blogger recently sent me a link to an article about an aspiring entrepreneur in the hydroponics field. You know the topic has hit the collective consciousness when bloggers begin to promote the approach. The important point here is that people are exploring possible ways of producing food in urban settings. While I believe the best ways of doing this will be ecologically sound, we won’t know what those ways are without experimenting. In the end, I believe that agroecological systems will be more viable, as they integrate with local social and natural systems using time-tested production methods.
Urban Agroecology 
January 29, 2010 at 3:13 pm
“I can’t think of any technology that addresses more urgent issues than Valcent’s vertical farming system”, says Robert F Kennedy Jr.: http://bit.ly/cPb00g
February 2, 2010 at 9:38 pm
Thanks for the quote and link, Chuck.
The link is to a video of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., promoting another hydroponic system, manufactured by Valcent Products, Inc. This underscores my point that there is increasing entreprenurial interest in these systems. The reason, of course, is that these systems offer opportunities for investors to make profits. Kennedy describes a 7,000 square foot, 20 foot high ‘unit’ that could be placed on a rooftop. (This would require, for example, a 70 foot by 100 foot rooftop or empty lot.) He makes all sorts of claims about what these systems can do, including democratizing the food system, creating entreprenurial centers, allowing people in depressed neighborhoods to grow their own food and creating jobs.
Take a close look at the website of Valcent Products, the company whose products Kennedy is promoting [link: http://www.valcent.net/s/Home.asp http://www.valcent.net/s/HDVGS.asp?ReportID=264273%5D. You’ll notice that the site is long on claims of what the systems can do, but short on any hard data. Anyone familiar with startup companies will recognize the hyperbole. In particular, look at this page describing their “High Density Vertical Growing Systems.” You will see that all the claims are in comparison to existing industrial agriculture production methods. There are no comparisons to agroecological methods. This is because hydroponics has some advantages over other industrial agricultural methods. But, agroecology has advantages over both, so don’t expect to see comparisons of hydroponic systems to agroecological methods. One advantage of agroecology is that its methods are less equipment intensive and, therefore, less capital intensive, than industrial agriculture, both traditional and hydroponic. That makes it more difficult for large investors to profit from agroecological systems. So, they would rather not even bring up that comparison.
What concerns me most about Kennedy’s promotional video is his claim that this system provides opportunities for people in depressed areas to have their own small-scale hydroponic systems to produce their own food. What he fails to mention is the cost of those systems. Costs aren’t provided at the company’s website, but I’ll wager that few individuals in depressed areas have the funds to build a 7,000 square foot high-tech facility. Where would these folks get the capital to invest in all the hydroponics equipment? Where would they get the operating funds to purchase the industrial chemicals required to produce food hydroponically? If incursions of industrial agricultural corporations into developing countries are any guide, and I think they are, hydroponic systems would be sold to people who can’t afford them by providing loan packages along with promises of profits. This hasn’t worked well for the people of developing countries, although it has helped large corporations and lenders. I expect similar poor results to occur if hydroponic systems and loans are packaged for low-income people in cities. The last thing low-income communities need is banks and corporations sucking money out of their communities.
It doesn’t take much money to build a few raised beds and to use organic methods to grow your own food. That’s all it takes to grow a significant amount of food. So, it makes more sense for those without significant capital to use that low-cost approach rather than an expensive hydroponics system. In addition, agroecological methods are relatively low cost, in part because there is no need to purchase chemical supplies. For examples of existing, successful urban agricultural approaches that have had success working in low-income communities helping people to grow their own food, see:
–Oakland, CA: City Slicker Farms [link: http://cityslickerfarms.org/WhatWeDo2.htm%5D
teaches people, mostly in West Oakland’s low-income neighborhood, how to grow their food through a Backyard Gardening Program (Disclosure: I’m a backyard garden mentor volunteer with CSF).
–Milwaukee, WI: Growing Power and Walnut Way Conservation Corp. both farm urban lands in Milwaukee. Growing Power has a large single plot, while Walnut Way has numerous small plots. Both have strong educational programs to teach people how to grow their own food. See this article
[link: http://americancity.org/daily/entry/853/%5D for more information and links to both projects.
Kennedy ends the video by saying “I can’t think of any other technology that addresses so many problems simultaneously.” I’ll offer him one: agroecology. And agroecology doesn’t require the huge capital and operating expense outlays of the systems he is promoting.
February 18, 2010 at 9:39 pm
I’m late and catching up, but really liked this post, RR. Good and helpful analysis. If I ever get something substantive on my blog again ;-), I’ll find a reason to link to this. Good stuff.