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Vertical Farms Synthesis Essay

While vertical farms give access to year-round crops and give life back to places harmed by climate change (source B), the ethical and environmental strain it has could be catastrophic for our future. Not only does vertical farming cost significantly more but it also takes away jobs from farmers and requires copious amounts of continuous energy to survive. These factors make it hard to decide if vertical farms are economically sustainable for what they produce.

Vertical farming uses closed, climate-controlled farms to hydroponically produce fresh fruits and vegetables. These controlled farms can be anywhere from shipping crates to windowless rooms that are soil and energy-powered to replicate outside environments (source D). Just one of these containers costs between $82,000-$85,000 and uses 80 kilowatt-hours of electricity a day. “With this usage comes the emission of about 44,000 pounds of CO2 per container per year, from only electricity and sun replication.” (source D). This poses incredibly high environmental risk and contributes to pollution and climate change on a global scale which is what they are trying to eliminate.

Although, this farming contributes to environmental risks, “it makes it easier for farmers to grow regional and seasonal crops year-round.” (source B). As a result of this, consumers are more likely to continue purchasing these crops without the worry of them being out of season. Vertical farming also gives purpose to discarded infrastructure and uses less land than that of traditional farming (source B).

Scientifically it's hard to outweigh the risks over the benefits. Although vertical farming uses increasing amounts of energy and produces less nutrient-dense food, the investment in land area and artificially controllable climates (source C) have benefited many places around the world. The use of land versus the amount of people that need to be fed has skyrocketed since 2010 making vertical farming beneficial today. (source E)

The use of vertical farming has its benefits and risks no matter what. Ethically and environmentally it isn't sustainable and poses availability to only the high-earning and higher-income class because of its production prices, but overall we can feed more people and continue growing crops that would otherwise die because of climate change. This puts the decision up to you on whether you feel it is important to support vertical farming or not.

DMU Timestamp: April 25, 2024 00:32





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