It is already a common sight that larger grocery stores bake their baked goods on site, so customers are always greeted with fresh products, and they are able to respond flexibly to their needs. However, in some countries, customers can already harvest fresh vegetables in stores. The SweGreen company has set up “closets” in Germany and Sweden in which up to a hundred types of plants can be grown. For now, the structure, perhaps most reminiscent of an aquarium, is available in two sizes. Salads and herbs are offered in 12 or 45 square meter counters.
The managing director of the Csillagváros vertical farm, Valent Petra and development engineer Gergely Csulik know the Swedish model well, they are also using similar methods to continue the experiments in Hungary in order to map the advantages and disadvantages of the hydroponic cultivation method, as well as the possibilities of spreading it. (Hydroponics is a method of growing plants that does not work with soil, but with the use of a nutrient liquid.) Currently, a 400-square-meter former factory building houses their work, but they are already planning to expand and move, because they hope to soon become well-known and popular in our country. the crops produced in this way become
Because for now there are people’s objections to the hydroponic cultivation method. They say: this is unnatural, since plants do not grow in soil, they are not baked by the sun, they are not soaked by rain. This is true, by the way. And this is precisely the huge advantage of this system: since the plants are not exposed to the whims of the weather, they receive exactly the amount they need of everything – water, nutrients, light – and thus they are able to reach consumption in a shorter time. In addition, while the period in which we can grow plants on open land is severely limited, in the plant factory you can harvest continuously for 12 months, every few weeks. This eliminates seasonality. At the same time, neither pests nor plant diseases threaten the herd – although very strict hygiene standards must be observed, you can’t just sneak into the growing rooms from the street. We can only look at the greens lined up on the shelves from the outside, through the window.
During the operation of the system, the parameters are continuously monitored with the help of a computer, and the optimal temperature, moisture content, water and nutrient dosing, fans, and light are set for the plants. Gergely Csulik also showed that, for example, in the case of lighting, different wavelengths of light can be adjusted separately, so that in the end the composition is the most favorable from the point of view of the plant’s development, but at the same time it does not harm the eyes of the workers. He added: they are able to set different parameters on the two shelves next to each other, adapting to the needs of plants in different stages of development. “On one shelf there is April, on the other May,” he summarized the essence of the otherwise rather complicated technology in a simplified way.
Another huge advantage of vertical farms is water conservation. “In open-field cultivation, for example, about 120 liters of water are needed to produce one head of lettuce. In a high-tech greenhouse, this is 15 liters, and in our case, if you ask me, I say one liter, Gergő says the other half, because he also includes the water used for cleaning,” explained Petra Valent about the amazing difference. He added: this method of cultivation is also completely chemical-free, and since the plants get the best of everything, their nutrient content is also uniform, reliably uniform, not fluctuating, as in the case of open field cultivation, where it is completely unpredictable depending on how much sunlight and precipitation they receive. . And this is not only important for vegetables and herbs, but especially for medicinal herbs, so that the breakthrough of hydroponic cultivation can be expected in their cultivation as well. In India and China, where there is a long tradition of using herbs, these systems are already used in several areas.
Of course, we shouldn’t keep silent about the disadvantage of plant factories: their energy requirements are high. In Sweden, where the share of renewables in the energy mix is much higher, electricity costs about one-seventh as much as in Hungary, so it is more worthwhile to bring production into a controlled environment there. For now, this is one of the most important factors that makes the products produced in this way more expensive. However, the project will soon leave the purely experimental phase, in order to introduce people to these plants, tastings will be held every Friday and Saturday in Budapest, at the Fény utca market. Here, they show and explain how the cultivation takes place, so that customers get closer to it, accept the hydroponic method, and understand: these plants are just as healthy as those grown in the field.
For now, the menu includes salads and herbs, but they have also experimented with beets and strawberries, and now one of their serious plans is wasabi. There is a huge demand for this, and since the plant is originally grown next to rivers, it would definitely feel good on the vertical farm. Micro-vegetables are also grown here, and they are even tested in space as part of a project to provide astronauts with fresh, vitamin-rich plants. “We sent seeds into outer space, and when they return, we sow them and examine how cosmic radiation affected them,” Petra Valent introduced the futuristic importance of plant factories.
Source: nepszava.hu
