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Vertical farms are a crock because transport of crops is easy. Moving people is much harder. This is why economic centers are densely populated, but can stil
by parfe 16y ago
Vertical farms are a crock because transport of crops is easy. Moving people is much harder. This is why economic centers are densely populated, but can still eat food shipped from 1000 miles away. There is no reason to spend millions to build vertically when you can buy cheap land and transport the products to the most profitable markets on demand.
- slapshot 16y agoThis. People should be dense, farms should be sparse. Taking city land to grow crops is NOT carbon-efficient. The far more carbon-efficient method would be to use city land for more housing, and use suburbia for farms. Think of it this way: people commute both ways every day, but food commutes only once. I'm not even going to get into the idea that it's more carbon-efficient to grow bananas in South America and ship them to New York than it would be to heat and light a greenhouse in New York...
- ajdecon 16y agoI agree with most of this post. But, a small correction: food only commutes in, but then waste commutes back out again. Unless you propose to build landfills in the city.