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How much would it cost to cover 100 acres with LEDs?

• dekhn 7y ago
  see my comment about overhead costs. However there are a number of interesting details: since with LEDs you can stack plants vertically, the horizontal area is less important. You can also keep things more compact (plants in a field aren't particularly dense) with light coming in at multiple angles leading to bushier plants with more growable surface area. I guess the real question is, "what are the amortized costs of growing using solar panels and LEDs compared to fields", and that's a super hard problem to solve/estimate. So far, people have only been growing high-profit crops, so it seems like the economics don't favor interior growing yet even for well-heeled players.
  • 14 7y ago
    There are massive benefits to growing indoors in certain conditions. Areas that were previously too hot or too cold could now be used to grow provided you have access to power. I one day think we will have portable nuclear generators and don't think this will be an issue. I don't think it will be economical in every situation but I do think there will be some market for indoor crops. The other factor I think of with indoor crops is with artificial you can optimize it both intensity and duration for different crops so you can also grow a bigger variety of crops in areas previously not possible. What if we could grow almonds closer to an abundant water source, or peppers in the frigid north closer to the people who eat them instead of shipping them large distances.