OpEn Farming: Holistic optimization of the energy system vertical farming through integration into the circular economy
| Project coordination | Prof. Dr. Thomas Hamacher, Director of MEP, Professor in ENS Dr. Petra Liedl, MEP, Director of the Project Group Food-Water-Energy-Nexus |
| Partners | Prof. Dr. Heike Mempel, HSWT mit Sabine Wittmann, HSWT, www.hswt.de/forschung/forschungseinrichtungen/asc.html Prof. Jasper den Besten, BrightBox, Niederlande Vivek Jadhav, Precede, Singapur |
| Funding | This project is funded by the Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning on behalf of the Federal Ministry of the Interior with funding from the Zukunft Bau research promotion program. |
| Duration | November 2021 until October 2023 |
| Contact | Smajil Halilovic, Nashmin Elyasi |
Project description
Vertical farming (VF) allows the production of food with a consistent quality throughout the year and close to the consumer. It has the potential to become a key technology, especially in urban areas, to ensure sustainable food security in times of urban population growth, climate change and water scarcity. The advantages are weather independence, controlled conditions with optimized water and fertilizer use, and multiple utilization of the land area. Light use energy efficiency (MJ/kg dry weight) is superior to even the most efficient greenhouses. However, vertical farming concepts are controversial in terms of sustainable production. The energy demand and the costs for lighting and air conditioning cannot compete with traditional agriculture or greenhouses. High investment and operating costs stand in the way of large-scale implementation. The environmental impact is high due to the high energy consumption and conventional energy supply.
In the research project, vertical farming is considered as a holistic system with the aim of developing an optimized building, technology as well as energy concept that shows the synergies with the production of food and reduces the environmental impact as far as possible. Based on a building model for Vertical Farming, a simulation model will be developed, which shows in detail the thermodynamic interactions between plant and building and evaluates energetically the parameters light, tempering, ventilation, irrigation and nutrients in all production stages. The aim is to identify synergies between them and to optimize the overall VF system in terms of energy. This is done on the basis of real data from the partners' indoor farms and taking into account the optimal conditions for the plants. VF can only be sustainable if the high energy consumption is reduced, renewable energy is supplied and integration into a circular economy is successful.
Central research questions are:
- To what extent can an optimized building design and the activation of synergy effects between the individual parameters reduce the energy demand of VF? Boundary conditions are a high yield as well as economic constraints.
- Can a circular economy reduce greenhouse gases to the point where VF has the potential to be a sustainable system for urban food production?