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Vertical Farming. Sustainable Solution or an Energy Burden?

Lisa Miles

Vertical farming is often promoted as a sustainable alternative to traditional agriculture, offering efficient land use, reduced water consumption, and the potential for localised food production in urban areas. However, I read a recent news article that suggests that the environmental benefits may not be as clear-cut as once thought. A new report indicates that vertical farming could generate almost twice the CO₂ emissions of conventional field farming, largely due to the intensive energy demands of artificial lighting and climate control systems.

I’d be interested to hear thoughts from any EngX community members working in agriculture, energy systems, or sustainability.

What are your thoughts on the viability of vertical farming, and where do you see the biggest opportunities for improvement? How can we optimise energy efficiency in controlled-environment agriculture? Are there emerging technologies (such as adaptive lighting, renewable integration, or AI-driven climate systems) that could mitigate these impacts? And how do you evaluate sustainability trade-offs when designing food systems for the future?

  • Not my area of expertise (the closest I can boast is a conventional greenhouse) but I suspect it's another case of pros and cons. The biggest problem I suspect the need for artificial lighting - hence a lot of the calculations depend on how the locally available electricity is generated. I would guess that using solar panels for instance to generate electricity to generate light, will be somewhat less efficient that just putting the plants out under the sun in the first place. On the other hand the enclosed approach does give you a lot more control over the growing environment - e.g. some plants might thrive better with longer or shorter daylight hours that the location might naturally provide, and it would be much much easier to control pests and diseases and of course temperature. So I suspect it will find a niche for certain crops that do less well outside - delicate, out-of-season or more exotic things - but for the bulk of the stapes, I suspect conventional outdoor, or simple poly-tunnel/glasshouse in appropriate locations will be the winner.

      - Andy.

  • “Sustainable” is a simple word but a very difficult concept. What is meant to be achieved and what are the system boundaries?

    In simplistic terms growing plants requires 5 things, Water, Light, Nutrients, Warmth and CO2.

    In a field these are all supplied, but not consistently, so growth is not maximized but generally proves to be sufficient.

    In a greenhouse the temperature is generally higher, promoting growth, and the water and nutrients can be better controlled. The light is supplied by the sun and so varies with the seasons and weather. Greenhouses are usually heated by burning gas or oil which also increases the CO2 level and further promotes growth.

    Using a greenhouse means you can grow more plants in a reduced space and time but at an additional cost. For higher value plants this probably makes sense.

    How would the ‘sustainability’ be measured? What are the system boundaries? What value is put on the land area used? Is transport to the place of consumption considered? Is it better to grow something locally in a greenhouse or to transport it from a distant place with a more suitable climate? Over what timescale do you amortize the energy and resources used to build and operate a green house in comparison to open fields with transport, irrigation and fertilizers?

     

    Vertical farming takes this to the next level. The growth of plants is certainly optimized for space and time. With artificial lighting 24hr growth is possible, however as Andy pointed out where does the electricity for the light come from. Solar PV and batteries is probably not a sensible option. As with greenhouses over what period are the energy and resources required to build the system amortized?

    The suggestion is that vertical farming can be used to supply food directly in urban areas. How much space is really required to produce, for example, enough wheat for 50 000 people? Where is the wheat processed into flour, also locally in the urban area? Where is the nutrient mix produced and what is the energy consumption and waste produced.

    What are the expected benefits of vertical farming? The main one I can see is a reduction in transport emissions but what is the payback against the increased emissions from vertical farming?

     

    The same system based approach can be used for ‘sustainable’ electricity generation. What is the system? Is it just a wind turbine or solar PV system, this may well produce a payback. Does it include interconnecting cable systems from the North Sea or some remote part of Scotland, the payback is becoming less. Is it required to supply dispatchable electricity so storage or back up systems are required, there is probably no payback.

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