Vertical farming on the rise in B.C. but facing challenges for land, say advocates
Lettuce can be grown under LED lights no matter the time
or season, farmers want more access to ALR land
Farming for Alycia van der Gracht means producing up to 900 heads of lettuce a month inside a classroom at the University of the Fraser Valley in Chilliwack, B.C.
She grows shelves of lettuce, cilantro and bok choy in just a two-by-four metre space in a highly controlled environment under LED lights, no matter the season or time of day.
"You use less water, you use your own sunlight, so if it's shadowy or cloudy or winter, the plants still get everything they need, " said van der Gracht about her vertical farm, called QuantoTech, which uses no pesticides, fungicides, or herbicides.
Vertical farming in B.C. is a growing sector of agriculture known as agritech. B.C.'s Ministry of Agriculture said there are currently 150 agritech companies in the province, which produce microgreens, leafy greens and herbs using fewer resources such as water.
Growers like van der Gracht say vertical farming combats food insecurity, especially in rural or northern communities.
"It's really important to have something scalable and local that you can grow and not be cut off," she said.
Experts say the futuristic way of growing food is way to combat climate change and food insecurity. They also say, though, that vertical farmers like van der Gracht's are facing challenges over where they are able to operate.
ALR friendly to vertical farmers?
Lenore Newman, director of the food and agriculture institute at the University of the Fraser Valley, said vertical farmers face challenges such as high startup and operational costs, and navigating government policy, such as rules that govern B.C.'s Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR) land.
The ALR protects approximately 4.7 million hectares of arable land in B.C. and according to the Agricultural Land Reserve Use Regulation, constructing a structure for indoor or vertical farming is allowed only if the total area from which soil is removed or fill is placed is 1000 m² or less.
"It's difficult to do vertical farming on the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR). It's possible but … there's a lot of caveats to that," said Newman.
She and others want to see provincial rules changed to make more ALR land available to budding vertical farmers, considering that finding space in industrial areas is difficult and expensive.
"Industrial land costs millions of dollars more, there is almost a zero vacancy rate for industrial," said Newman.
A provincial 2019 Food Insecurity Task Force Report outlined several recommendations to help increase food security in the face of climate change in B.C. They included more space for growing food, better transportation systems and allowing farms to be closer to processors.
Newman wants the province to move faster on these recommendations that she says could help vertical farmers.
"It's been two years so we're kind of missing the bus. This actually makes me quite angry, that we're still sitting around waiting to see what's going to happen," said Newman who added that she remains hopeful progress will be made.
Van der Gracht is also hopeful that the province will change rules to allow bigger vertical farm operations on ALR land.
"We'd be much more productive on that land. And we don't need any of the nice land," she said.
Newman and her colleagues said a significant portion of B.C.'s agricultural land reserve is unused or underutilized. The task force report said that while the most fertile land should be protected for agricultural production, up to 0.25 per cent of ALR land with low soil quality, ill-suited for farming should be allocated for agritech.
The Ministry of Agriculture says it is continuing to study the task force's recommendations, with an update to come in the spring of 2022.
Dave Dinesen, CEO of CubicFarms in Langley, said he's hopeful changes will come to B.C.'s agritech sector that allow it to quickly expand.
His company sells modules, worth $150,000 each, that fit in shipping containers and can grow up to 300,000 leafy green, herbs or microgreen plants each year.
Dinesen says the technology dramatically reduces the need for water. One module can grow as much lettuce as is produced on a piece of land the size of a football field.
The modules also use approximately one litre of water to grow one head of lettuce. The same head of lettuce grown in a field would require 24 litres of water, according to Dinesen.
Dinesen also said vertical farming made possible with technology, which his company supplies, produces local food and reduces the need for complicated and vulnerable supply chains.
"There's not much more vulnerability than food supply," he said. "And we've seen these types of panics in stores when borders are closed or roads are washed [out] … we're seeing all of these problems."
Calgary
A former geologist imports a popular Chinese model to grow veggies year-round in Alberta's harsh climate
Passive solar greenhouse operates without fossil fuels to
grow tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, cabbages and more
Dong Jianyi has taken an almost scientific approach to growing tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, cabbages and other fresh vegetables at his unconventional farm operation near Olds, Alta.
The former geologist who worked in the oil and gas sector now runs a passive solar greenhouse operation that allows him to grow veggies year-round — and without using any conventional fossil fuel sources to keep his veggies nice and toasty during Alberta's harsh winter climate.
Dong's Fresh Pal Farms is believed to be one of the largest commercial passive solar greenhouses in Alberta.
He closely monitors and graphs the temperatures inside and outside the greenhouse, moisture and humidity levels and soil conditions. He also keeps an eye out for diseases and pests. Tracking all of the conditions comes with challenges, but he says it's going well.
Last year, he produced more than 13,000 kilograms of tomatoes alone.
"I really like agriculture and I think it's good opportunity," Dong said in early December from California, where he was working as an agriculture consultant.
A recent visit to the greenhouse confirmed that tomatoes and cabbages were still growing in early December — one of the final crops before Dong and his small team transition to planting seedlings for next year.
Before that, they might sneak in a crop of hardy leafy vegetables such as kale or spinach, which he says can tolerate the shorter days with fewer hours of sunshine.
Dong, 40, came to Canada in 2014 shortly after quitting his job with an oil service company in China. At the time, oil prices were crashing and he was looking for a more stable future for himself and his young family, so he decided to transition to agriculture.
He says passive solar greenhouses are common in his native China, but he wanted to know if that same model could be duplicated here.
"In north China, it also gets really cold and pretty dark in winter, but people can grow year-round."
He spent six months working and learning about the model in Manitoba. He also travelled back to his native China to talk to farmers, builders and manufacturers as part of his research before launching his operation.
The $250,000 greenhouse kit was shipped from China in two containers.
Dong and his wife put it together almost entirely on their own. He even welded all of the steel pieces together after taking a four-day welding course.
'It feels like you are not in Olds'
The greenhouse is an impressive structure.
It's located east of Olds in Mountain View County. It's 100 metres long, 10 metres wide and six metres tall — the growing area inside covers about 750 square metres. Lengthwise, it runs east to west to maximize exposure to the sun.
The roof and south-facing wall are made up of two layers of polyolefin plastic with the air in between acting as an insulation barrier.
The north wall, or the back of the greenhouse, is made out of clay and is one metre thick. The clay acts as a heat sink, capturing and storing heat from the sun during the day and releasing it through the night.
A large, thick, retractable blanket is lowered into place when the sun sets and is raised in the morning shortly after dawn.
In early December, the outside temperature was –5 C, but it was 28 C inside the greenhouse.
"You can feel kind of a wave of heat, a little bit of humidity, the smell, it feels like you are not in Olds, and you are somewhere tropical," said Sarah Singer, one of the volunteers at Fresh Pal Farms who provided a tour of the greenhouse.
She's drawn to the operation for its unique features and minimal environmental impact compared to conventional greenhouses.
"People are surprised how large it is, that there is no heat and he runs it through the winter," she said.
"People like the smell when they come in.… In the winter, they'll say it's so warm in here."
Dong estimates it would cost nearly $30,000 per month to heat a similarly sized greenhouse that relies on a heating source fuelled by natural gas.
Extreme weather, big challenges
There are challenges. The winter can be too cold and too dark. And the summers can be too hot. Dong says this past summer saw a week long heatwave with temperatures peaking at 36 C in late June.
"The tomatoes, cucumbers, they don't grow well. They may crack, they may look ugly. That's a challenge," he said.
He doesn't use any fans during those high temperature days. Instead, he opens the bottom of the north wall and a portion of the roof to allow hot air to escape. He also rolls the blanket down to prevent the tomatoes from burning in the midday sun.
And there's the cold. Dong says it dipped to –38 C last winter, dropping the temperature inside the greenhouse to –5 C. He says they can add a layer of plastic over the tomato plants to protect them.
Is passive the future?
The manager of the botanic gardens and greenhouses at Old College says it's been exciting to watch Dong's passive solar project come together, including some of the innovative ways he's been dealing with heat and ventilation challenges in the summer and snow load in the winter.
"I'm really, really keen to see how how somebody like Jianyi can single-handedly innovate the way that we're growing in Alberta. So it has been really exciting to see his work.," said Daniel Chappell.
Chappell, who converted an old barn into a passive solar greenhouse, says this type of model is attracting interest from people who are concerned about the environmental impact of traditional greenhouses, transportation costs and food security.
The challenge can be fronting the cost. He says the payback will come in subsequent years from not having to pay heating or cooling costs.
"So a lot of people who are trying to move into farming on a very small scale near urban centres, very, very keenly interested in this kind of thing," he said.
"If you can find the money to build it, but then it doesn't cost you thousands of dollars a month to heat it, then there's a lot of immediate benefit to be able to grow as a business person."
Dong says that while he caters most of his business to the Chinese community in Olds and Calgary, he'd like to expand his offerings.
"I'd like to try the farmers' market and let everybody taste my produce."
He'd also like to help growers set up their own passive solar greenhouse operations by helping import the ready-to-build kits from China.
