We all know that the cost of food is skyrocketing, and the cost of gas just makes the burden of getting food to the plate all that much more difficult.
I recently started getting deliveries from Spud! organic delivery service (previously Pioneer Organics). The goal was to try to eat more fruits and vegetables, which has worked, but it has also taught me about restraint in eating foods that are not grown close to home. You see, the one thing that Spud! does is list how many miles a product travels to get to its Portland warehouse.
I was looking at my current order for the week and admiring a tempting photo of kiwis, then moved my mouse over the product. What I got was “kiwi: New Zealand. It traveled 7030 miles to reach our Portland warehouse.” Wow. No kiwis for me, thankyouverymuch. It looked tasty, but when I learned how far it traveled, it was so much easier to decide not to purchase it.
That brings me to the subject at hand, the Vertical Farm Project. A vertical farm is just that—a place to grow food vertically, in a skyscraper. Columbia University has done quite a bit of research, and I believe they are now looking for an area to implement their idea. Hey Columbia, how about Portland?
Portland has the supporters, it has the know-how of quite a few farmers nearby, and well, it would just be cool to have a living building here that proves this idea can work in other areas around the world. It may not be the end-all be-all solution (none of them are), but it’s a great idea.
What I want to know is, will they be able to grow kiwis (and pineapples, and mangos, and bananas) in a vertical farm?
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I’m glad you find the food miles information useful. We’re really passionate about local food. In fact we’re working with many local farms including Gee Creek Farm in Ridgefield. Lyle Stanley of Gee Creek just dropped of some of the best looking chard we’ve seen in quite some time. Plus, it only traveled 13 miles to get here. yay.
Peter from spud!
I’m curious why you’re so worried about the food distance? I’ve read that only 4% of food’s carbon footprint comes from travel from grower to seller. That means that the overall carbon footprint is likely much lower if food is grown where it is most efficient to grow it, then shipped.
http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/journals/esthag-w/2008/apr/science/ee_foodmiles.html
Oops the 4% citation comes from here:
http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/esthag/2008/42/i10/abs/es702969f.html
“We find that although food is transported long distances in general (1640 km delivery and 6760 km life-cycle supply chain on average) the GHG emissions associated with food are dominated by the production phase, contributing 83% of the average U.S. household’s 8.1 t CO2e/yr footprint for food consumption. Transportation as a whole represents only 11% of life-cycle GHG emissions, and final delivery from producer to retail contributes only 4%. “
@anonymous – I’m not *just* concerned about food distance – although, when your food comes from 7030 miles away, maybe you should be. It’s just one contributing factor to greenhouse gas emissions, as the study you point to says (thank you, by the way, for the reference – the more studies we have out there the better in my opinion).
My perspective is that we have to look at all of the ways we are impacting the earth in the choices that we make, not just the obvious ones.
Interesting article. I wonder if the study distinguishes between conventional and organic crops. While both use carbon producing machinery to plant and harvest I can’t help but wonder if the organic farming practices which rely more on nature are more efficient.
Even if they are not, there is an added benefit of supporting your local community by buying organic, and that wonderfully fresh taste when you bit into produce that was picked fresh and consumed.
Agree with the aspect of supporting local economies. I suspect that in many cases organic farming is *less* efficient, simply due to lower yields.
Not that yields should be the only measure of success. I buy organic because I’d rather not ingest unnatural chemicals.
One takeaway from the article is that if one’s goal is to reduce the carbon footprint, the place to start is minimizing meat and dairy. Though I would like to see a measure of “carbon footprint per calorie” for different foods. Even then, I suspect red meat would lose out to fruits and veggies. And fruit trees are prettier to look at than cows.
I really want to see this project succeed because I think this is could be a solution to are rising food shortage…I am trying to get the first working tower built: http://www.thepoint.com/campaigns/vertical-farm-in-new-york-city
I’ve been looking into Vertical farms for over a year now. It seems like the best way to get it here in Portland is for us to do it ourselves. It would also put more money back into Portland then to some business man in another state/country. This can be done, it just needs a lot of work. Which is another thing Portlanders need. I’ve been researching this a lot, and would love to be apart of the project!
@Vhan – Vhan I organize a group that is working on getting a vertical farm to portland and would love for you to join, http://www.meetup.com/FarmUP/
Thank you for finding me!
Vhan is a cock. I didn’t know if any of the rest of you knew that.
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