With temperature, light and humidity controlled across 12 growing 'rooms,' pollination of plants has also been engineered to be more efficient than bees.
I need more details on this "more efficient than bees" claim. I grow a couple of hydroponic strawberry plants for fun, and every strawberry is a result of my swirling a toothbrush around a flower. I am having a hard time imagining scaling that up without bees.
The Richmond farm uses 97% less land
Sounds too good to be true. Does this account for land use of the electricity production system?
For every 10sqm saved in farm area, how many extra sqm does the energy production require?
I know it's possible to put solar on rooftop. But it's also possible to have a greenhouse on the rooftop or last floor of a building, and greenhouses need almost no energy in comparison.
Solar over normal farmland used for hand/robot-picked plants that like a certain amount of shade is also an option. I'm curious how many acres of solar you'd need to support one acre of this scale of vertical farming.
I don't see how vertical farming can make sense. There is only so much sunlight striking the ground and you just changed the angle and so shaded something else.
Read the article - it's indoors.
That doesn't change anything. unless you have a perpetual motion machine the energy comes from somewhere.
Eh?
On second thoughts, don't bother.
Goodbye.