Pink light veggies

刊登 30.11.2022

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How integrating cutting-edge food production technology into buildings can reconnect us to nature, address the food crisis and tackle climate change.

Food is a fundamental human need. It has the power to bring people together and overcome language barriers but, unfortunately, it’s also one of the largest drivers of climate change, loss of biodiversity and land exploitation.

The United Nations’ (UN) Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) estimates that our global food system accounts for 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions, with a third of our food being wasted and unequal distribution of resources deepening inequality around the world. Climate change is already impacting our crops, and research on climate change has shown that land productivity has already reduced by 21% since the 1960s due to extreme weather events, floods and desertification – this figure is worse in warm areas such as central and northern Africa, the Caribbean and the northern regions of South America. Reinventing our food system in a holistic and sustainable manner is essential if we’re to deliver sustainable, high-quality food and nutrition to all.

For nearly three decades, the UN has been bringing nations and world leaders together to tackle the climate emergency. This month the 27th UN Conference of the Parties (COP27) was hosted in Sharm El-Sheikh, where global leaders gathered to deliver actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, build resilience to a changing climate and fundraise for climate action in developing countries.

On 7 November, as part of the busy COP27 agenda, a roundtable on food security explored the implications that our current food system has on our environment and communities. At the event, several global leaders and institutions, including the International Finance Corporation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and other private investors, collectively pledged more than $7 billion to support affordable, fair and innovative food solutions in vulnerable contexts. While this is a huge commitment to change, we now need to make sure this money is used in the most effective way. As the world transitions to a green economy, governments and cities need to take action to secure accessible food and nutrition for future generations and support developments that can be part of this process. Urban farming is one potential solution that the built environment industry can bring to the table.

We as architects, designers and urban planners have a responsibility to actively contribute to a change in the way food is produced, transported and consumed. By integrating urban farming into our cities, urban spaces and buildings, we can pave the way to a healthy world that prioritises wellbeing, reduces inequalities, encourages responsible consumption and ends global hunger.

Urban farming and sustainable agriculture

There’s no one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to sustainable agriculture and urban farming. Solutions depend on a wide variety of factors such as a region’s climate, access to water, soil and air pollution, and land use.

Reconnecting cities with the natural world by integrating urban farms and community gardens has proven to have a big impact on people’s wellbeing. At Make we’ve been looking into the future of agriculture in urban spaces and how cutting-edge technology and new ways of producing vegetables have the potential to reshape our food systems, wellbeing and built environment.

Vertical farming is one of the key technologies we’ve been researching, particularly hydroponics and aeroponics systems, as they’re proving to be an extremely efficient food production technique.

Hydroponics is a type of horticulture used to grow plants, largely leafy greens, without soil by dipping the roots in a nutrient-rich water solution. This technique allows plants to grow faster than traditional farming practices while dramatically reducing water consumption. Alternatively in an aeroponic environment, plant roots are suspended and sprayed with nutrient-rich solutions, further reducing water consumption while surpassing the yield factors of hydroponics. Both hydroponics and aeroponics can use LED artificial light that mimics photosynthesis (combining red and blue light, creating the pink colour we often see in high-tech farms) or natural light, making it possible to grow plants anywhere. Vertical farming also allows for the densification of crops, reducing the need for agricultural land and, by extension, deforestation and land clearing.

Minimised irrigation is extremely effective in arid areas like the Middle East, where a fast-growing population and geopolitical instabilities lead to unsustainable forms of desert farming as the only source of food production. In other parts of the world where soil is more suitable for agriculture, pollution can still be a big threat to food security. Contaminated soils and acid rains affect food quality and consequently people’s health. High-tech farming gives us the opportunity to eliminate the use of chemicals and pesticides by controlling the water solutions plants are fed with, resulting in food that’s nutritious and tasty while meeting commercial aesthetic expectations and reducing waste.

We can integrate vertical farming into large-scale masterplans and into office and residential buildings to reduce the timescale of food delivery from weeks to hours. This could look like green facades and roofs, and greenhouses on allocated lots within masterplans; there’s also potential to reuse existing buildings and infrastructure (such as industrial spaces or underground tunnels) for aeroponic farming and to use common spaces (such as lobbies and canteens) as extensions of kitchen gardens. Electric hyper-local delivery vehicles and smart ordering systems can also dramatically reduce packaging and waste while providing genuinely fresh food.

Innovation in urban farming is already happening around the globe. In Melbourne, Australia, Acre Farm and Eatery at the Burwood Brickworks shopping centre has integrated urban farming on its roof with a hydroponic glasshouse and a productive 2,500m² rooftop garden. The venue uses the produce in its farm-to-table restaurant and café, and it also runs workshops, cooking classes and volunteering programmes in the garden. Meanwhile in London Growing Underground is renting former Second World War bomb shelters from TfL to grow its own produce underground. Its Clapham-grown greens are now available in local supermarkets and are being used in restaurants around London. With urban farming opportunities being realised around the world, your next hydroponic salad could be just around the corner.

Here at Make our in-house sustainability team is looking into ways we can implement vertical farming and cutting-edge urban farming technology in our future masterplans, office buildings and hospitality projects. We imagine a world where we grow and harvest food in our houses, offices and restaurants, producing and consuming only what we need (with the best quality and taste), minimising our carbon footprint, and removing a sea of plastic wrappings from our bins.

While urban farming is just one of many ways we can lower our carbon footprint, it presents a real opportunity to boost our social, community and individual wellbeing through architecture, while simultaneously addressing the global food and climate crisis in a sustainable way.