In The Greenhouse: Rooftop Farming With Greenhouses

Most of the reasonably priced farmland is fairly far from urban settings. As a result, farm produce is trucked into cities to make it available to densely populated areas of consumers.

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As you move closer and closer to large cities, land prices quickly escalate until they are too formidable for use as farm land.
Transportation costs, however, are another factor in the final cost of our food. What if food could be produced, on a large scale, right in major metropolitan population centers? Also, assuming it could be grown very close to the consumer, could it be delivered the same day as harvest, avoiding refrigeration?

Everyone, it seems, likes to connect the concept of “local” with food items, especially fruits and vegetables. Although the term local has no set parameters, such as grown in the same state, grown within 100 miles, grown in the U.S., or some other constraint, it seems that the closer it comes from, the better it is.

What if large-scale food production could be done on top of large buildings which already exist in cities? Small, hobby greenhouses have
already appeared on top of city dwellers’ apartments, co-ops, and condominium buildings for years. But let’s think about scale here. To feed large numbers of people, huge greenhouses would be needed.

Montreal, like many large cities, has sprawled so far that it has taken in much of the rural areas around it. One such example of bringing the farm right into the city is a company in Montreal that is growing food on top of a large downtown office building.

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A New Place To Produce Food
Lufa Farms, designed and built by Mohamed Hage and Kurt Lynn, is a 32,000 square foot rooftop greenhouse. At this time, their crop mix includes tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, peppers, zucchini, eggplant, bok choi, celery, rosemary, basil, parsley, and many other selections.

Sales are handled using the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) model. For $22 per week, customers, who must sign up for a subscription in advance, will receive a small basket of produce which is available each week. A large basket costs $30 per week. The mix of vegetables varies each week depending on what is being harvested.
Another option includes the above choices, but adds in additional organic produce from some local farms, such as root vegetables and apples. The small basket with selected seasonal organics is $32 while the large basket is $42 per week.

The greenhouse environment temperature, humidity, lighting — is controlled with the use of a computer so that each zone can be optimized for the crop(s) within it. Rain water is collected for use in the irrigation system. Honeybees are used for pollination, and, while not certified organic, biological control is used for pest management in place of chemicals.

The initial investment was high, about $2 million. They will save, however, on transportation, packaging, and refrigeration since delivery is not far away and on the same day as harvest.

Lufa Farms intends to expand their production to include a cluster of greenhouses atop other buildings as well. They estimate that 10% of commercial rooftops in Canada could support a greenhouse.

This may be the way of the future, at least for city people. Will it work? It’s too early to say since this is the first year of production, but this is a great experiment in the field of rooftop farming.

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