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Vertical Farms

Whovian said:
worth researching a bit at least. I think it would be cost prohibitive.
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How so?

From what I can see, there doesnt seem to be much on these buildings that would drive up the costs beyond the buildings themselves.
 
A few issues come to mind. The building could not have any depth to it at all, or else the plants 1 or 2 rows in will get shaded by those in front. Also there would be issues getting a long enough photoperiod of direct lighting unless the building rotated throughout the daylight hours. Here in the northern hemisphere, the south side would get the abundance of light and would have productive growth, with the crops becoming more and more stunted as you get towards the north side. There is also issues of scaling this up, the towers -or if done in semi urban areas, other buildings - would shade each other, so there would be no way to get an efficient density.

fiber optic cable could alleviate some of these issues, but the best bet is to start designing and implementing rooftop gardens, or utilize the southern exposures of existing or future buildings for gardens. None of these are conducive to mass production and mass harvesting techniques though, it would be labor intensive since there is no way to utilize heavy machinery for plowing, sowing, fertilizing, harvesting and what not.

So its novel and worth exploring, but pending numerous technological breakthroughs it would be supplemental at best, and limited in what crops wold be ideal for this. I don't foresee grain, corn, cotton, rice, or any other major staple crops being produced efficiently or at low cost this way. A few veggies to sell at a local farmers market, perhaps.. but not much beyond that at this point.
 
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Here is something I just read about earlier today that is along these lines and as an urban dwelling skier and gardener I find simply awesome (the proposal includes vegetation/windowsill garden boxes along the sides of the multitasking structure):

Power station to double as laser-firing ski slope - CNN.com
 
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