Biomimetic Sky-Farm Captures Sun and CO2

Image SourceThe award winning "Dystopian Farm" incorporates some interesting architectural ingredients, in an attempt to create an urban high-rise agriculture for a rapidly urbanising world.

World population in urban centers is on the rise. Experts predict that by 2050 80% of the world's citizens will reside in an urban setting. These residents will need an estimated 109 hectares of arable land to provide their food. As space on the ground is limited, one increasingly attractive solution is to build upwards, creating vertical farms. _Ecogeek

Designed for the Hudson Yard area of Manhattan, Eric Vergne’s Dystopian Farm aims to provide New York with a sustainable food source while creating a dynamic social space that integrates producers with consumers. Based upon the “material logic of plant mechanics”, the biomorphic skyscraper is modeled after the plant cells of ferns and provides space for farms, residential areas, and markets. These organic structures will harness systems such as airoponic watering, nutrient technology and controlled lighting and CO2 levels to meet the food demands of future populations. _Inhabitat

Ideally, such a structure would incorporate novel grow-lighting methods including "light pipes", custom light cycling over a 24 hour period for optimal growth, and light spectrum customisation. As noted at Inhabitat, the DF will utilise aeroponic growing methods which do not require soil. CO2 levels should be controlled at much higher than ambient levels to better carbon-fertilise growing plants. Better methods of "nitrogen fixing" for a wide array of plant families are also needed, for such intensive urban farming.

Highly controlled, intensive urban farming methods should allow a reduction in the use of liquid fuels for shipping produce into cities. They would also provide more self-sufficiency for urban environments in the face of disruption of services and transport in the countryside. Finally, such test beds for closely controlled agriculture should prove useful when humans move their center of gravity off-planet, to less life-friendly surroundings.