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> I think the biggest problem with land-based farms is that there is only so much land available for it, and that land is also highly valued for other propertie

> I think the biggest problem with land-based farms is that there is only so much land available for it, and that land is also highly valued for other properties (such as residential and commercial ventures). I don't think you really understand the distribution of land use and urbanization in the world if you think construction of houses and shops are a substantial limiting factor in its agriculture. Your remedial assignment is to drive from Denver to Chicago. As for growing plants on another planet... and shipping them back to Earth... if you've got that sort of an energy budget to waste shipping food around why aren't you just building nuclear-powered underground greenhouse-caves or some nonsense like that?

jqm 11y ago
"Your remedial assignment is to drive from Denver to Chicago." Yep. Or just look out the airplane window at all those little green circles and squares next time you fly across the country.
falcolas 11y ago
> Your remedial assignment is to drive from Denver to Chicago. And yours is to drive from Boston to Miami. Or London to Glasgow. Or Osaka to Tokyo. Cherry picking a route through the breadbasket of America as an example of typical land distribution between urban and agricultural doesn't make for a convincing argument. > why aren't you just building nuclear-powered underground greenhouse-caves or some nonsense like that? Because any such location would be more valuable as a spot to pack more humans. Proximity (particularly when you start working on a planetary scale) to urban centers is worth a lot of money.
- fennecfoxen 11y ago
  > And yours is to drive from Boston to Miami. Or London to Glasgow. Or Osaka to Tokyo. I haven't driven from Boston to Miami in one trip, but I've traversed that entire corridor. My grandparents once owned a few acres on a private lake near Eastford, CT. Lots of cool old dairy-farms, apple orchards, berry-picking, bird-watching, wildlife, et cetera. Most of I95 south of Alexandria is rather boring -- hours and hours of trees -- if you're starting by DC it's a little more fun to divert along US 301, passing through horse territory and then rolling through Fort AP Hill. More travel time, but on the northern part of the route you're more likely to pass the occasional roadside produce stands. The southernmost bits are the ones I'm less familiar with, though those are possibly the most interesting as in Florida in particular there are places where urban development threatens the most sensitive ecosystems... but the Everglades were never known for agriculture. Agriculture does moreover threaten ecosystems across the midwest (one recent example: monarch butterflies have been suffering massive population drops in the past few years because Roundup-Ready crops have led to widespread herbicide application that kills the weeds that they'd use for food). But agriculture itself is not under substantial pressure from urban land use at this time. Look, let's ask the US Department of Agriculture: http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-information-bulletin/eib14.aspx http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-informatio... (2002). Urban land, 2.6% of the nation's land area. Crop land, 19.5%. Grassland pastures/ranges: 25.9%. -http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/249911/eib14fm_1_.pdf http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/249911/eib14fm_1_.pdf "In 2002, urban land in the United States was less than 3 percent of total land area, but housed 79 percent of the U.S. population." - http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/250013/eib14g_1_.pdf http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/250013/eib14g_1_.pdf Space for physical people has always been a nonissue next to space for their agriculture and other people-supporting land uses.

jqm 11y ago

"Your remedial assignment is to drive from Denver to Chicago." Yep. Or just look out the airplane window at all those little green circles and squares next time you fly across the country.

falcolas 11y ago

> Your remedial assignment is to drive from Denver to Chicago. And yours is to drive from Boston to Miami. Or London to Glasgow. Or Osaka to Tokyo. Cherry picking a route through the breadbasket of America as an example of typical land distribution between urban and agricultural doesn't make for a convincing argument. > why aren't you just building nuclear-powered underground greenhouse-caves or some nonsense like that? Because any such location would be more valuable as a spot to pack more humans. Proximity (particularly when you start working on a planetary scale) to urban centers is worth a lot of money.

fennecfoxen 11y ago
> And yours is to drive from Boston to Miami. Or London to Glasgow. Or Osaka to Tokyo. I haven't driven from Boston to Miami in one trip, but I've traversed that entire corridor. My grandparents once owned a few acres on a private lake near Eastford, CT. Lots of cool old dairy-farms, apple orchards, berry-picking, bird-watching, wildlife, et cetera. Most of I95 south of Alexandria is rather boring -- hours and hours of trees -- if you're starting by DC it's a little more fun to divert along US 301, passing through horse territory and then rolling through Fort AP Hill. More travel time, but on the northern part of the route you're more likely to pass the occasional roadside produce stands. The southernmost bits are the ones I'm less familiar with, though those are possibly the most interesting as in Florida in particular there are places where urban development threatens the most sensitive ecosystems... but the Everglades were never known for agriculture. Agriculture does moreover threaten ecosystems across the midwest (one recent example: monarch butterflies have been suffering massive population drops in the past few years because Roundup-Ready crops have led to widespread herbicide application that kills the weeds that they'd use for food). But agriculture itself is not under substantial pressure from urban land use at this time. Look, let's ask the US Department of Agriculture: http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-information-bulletin/eib14.aspx http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/eib-economic-informatio... (2002). Urban land, 2.6% of the nation's land area. Crop land, 19.5%. Grassland pastures/ranges: 25.9%. -http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/249911/eib14fm_1_.pdf http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/249911/eib14fm_1_.pdf "In 2002, urban land in the United States was less than 3 percent of total land area, but housed 79 percent of the U.S. population." - http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/250013/eib14g_1_.pdf http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/250013/eib14g_1_.pdf Space for physical people has always been a nonissue next to space for their agriculture and other people-supporting land uses.