In the heart of Shanghai, a team of innovators at the Global Institute of Future Technology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, has cracked the code on a pressing challenge in urban agriculture: making plant factories with artificial lighting (PFALs) more affordable and energy-efficient. Led by Thomas Xiong, the team has designed a container farm that could revolutionize the way we think about sustainable food production in cities.
The problem with traditional PFALs is clear: they’re expensive to build and operate, with high energy demands that can outweigh their environmental benefits. “We wanted to create a solution that was not only cost-effective but also energy-efficient,” Xiong explains. “Our goal was to make urban agriculture accessible and sustainable, even in resource-constrained environments.”
The result is a low-cost, energy-efficient container farm that uses mobile racks with reflective materials to maximize light usage, an adaptive environmental control system to regulate temperature and humidity, and an IoT framework for automated operation. The farm costs around $900 per square meter in terms of building area, a significant reduction compared to traditional PFALs.
During a 50-day trial, the container farm produced 95 kg of Frillice lettuce across a 15.56 square meter cultivation area. The energy consumption was measured at 43 kWh per day, with 72% of that energy going towards LED lighting, 14% towards HVAC, and the remaining 14% towards other operations. Impressively, the farm also demonstrated water recovery via HVAC condensate, collecting around 11.4 liters per day during the seedling phase.
The implications for the energy sector are substantial. As cities around the world grapple with food security and sustainability challenges, this technology offers a scalable, cost-effective approach for deploying PFALs. “This is not just about growing lettuce,” Xiong notes. “It’s about creating a model for sustainable urban food production that can be replicated and scaled up.”
The research, published in ‘Cleaner Engineering and Technology’ (which translates to ‘Cleaner Production and Technology’), opens up possibilities for integrating energy-efficient technologies into urban agriculture. It also highlights the potential of IoT and adaptive environmental control systems in optimizing resource usage.
As we look to the future, this research could shape the development of more efficient, sustainable urban farms. It’s a step towards a world where cities are not just concrete jungles, but thriving ecosystems that produce their own food sustainably. The energy sector, in particular, stands to gain from the reduced energy demands and improved efficiency of these container farms.
In the words of Thomas Xiong, “This is just the beginning. We’re excited to see how this technology can be further developed and applied to create a more sustainable future for urban agriculture.”