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Why would the price of food from a 'vertical farm' (shipping container in a parking lot) go down relative to the price food from regular farms? Even if it made
by stretchcat 6y ago
Why would the price of food from a 'vertical farm' (shipping container in a parking lot) go down relative to the price food from regular farms? Even if it made sense to grow using LEDs instead of direct sunlight, that could be done on rural land instead of urban parking lots. I don't think you'll ever get enough food grown in shipping containers in urban parking lots to be anything other than a curiosity for the wealthy.
These things are small by garden standards, let alone farm standards. How many people could one of these shipping containers keep fed? How many shipping containers would you need to feed a city of a million people?
- airstrike 6y agoShipping costs virtually zero
- stretchcat 6y agoA single truck can ship more food in one trip than one of these containers could produce in a year.
- pydry 6y agoThe same way any new tech goes down in price - commoditization, automation and economies of scale. It's unlikely they'll feed a million people all the food they'll need but it's likely they could feed a million people all of the leafy greens they need.
- stretchcat 6y ago"commoditization, automation and economies of scale." Traditional farms have the clear and overwhelming advantage in all three of these. And they aren't standing still either, they benefit from the advance of technology too.
- pydry 6y agoThe major advantage this has is that it shrinks the supply chain. Transporting fresh leafy greens is a bit of a nightmare because they go bad so quickly. I don't expect these things to compete with a farm growing potatoes for a long while or even anything which keeps well enough in a fridge.
- inglor_cz 6y agoDepends where you live. US has a lot of high-quality natural soil. Places like Israel and Saudi Arabia are much more limited by nature.
- Funes- 6y ago>How many shipping containers would you need to feed a city of a million people? I guess the aspiration for the people behind this kind of vertical farming companies is to have as many containers out there as possible. It seems like proximity of supply is one of their main purported selling points. It makes sense from their standpoint.