Vertical farm offers look at high-tech future for food production

The big, blocky building just north of Interstate 70 looks like all the other big, blocky buildings along a commercial and industrial strip in Aurora. Visitors have to scrub up, put on masks, hair nets and lab coats and walk on an antimicrobial mat before entering a massive clean room.

But the products being tended to under magenta-colored LED lights aren't computer chips or other high-tech parts. They are different varieties of lettuce that will be harvested and shipped to Denver-area grocery stores and restaurants.

The result of the highly engineered systems and technology is fresh, nutritious and non-genetically-modified food, said Aric Nissen, chief marketing officer for Kalera, a Florida-based company that builds and operates indoor, vertical farms.

The company began operations about a month ago in a 90,000-square-foot warehouse, which Nissen estimates is running at 30% capacity. In the next several months, Kalera expects to expand its workforce of 40 to about 100 and its operations to full capacity to harvest approximately 15 million heads of lettuce, or 2.5 million pounds.

Kalera has farms in Orlando, Fla., Atlanta, Munich and Kuwait. Farms are under construction in Honolulu, Seattle and Singapore.

"We're trying to produce food at scale in an urban area, close to where people live," Nissen said. "We want to let people know there's technology involved, but it's producing food naturally, without the use of chemicals or genetic modification."

Kalera's farms use hydroponics — water — to grow lettuce and microgreens, or vegetable seedlings. The New York Times reports the number of vertical farms is expected to expand as demand for year-round produce and the impact of climate change on agriculture increase. The industry is forecast to grow globally from $3.1 billion in 2021 to $9.7 billion by 2026, according to the data analysis company ResearchandMarkets.com.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture says besides providing fresh, locally grown produce, vertical farms could help boost food production as the world's population is projected to exceed 9 billion by 2050.

"Why vertical farming" is a question Nissen gets asked a lot. His answer?

"We're running out of farm land," Nissen said. "There is not enough arable land on the planet now to feed all the people who will be living on the planet. What do we want to do about that?"

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Photo: Red Oak leaf lettuce is packaged and boxed for shipment in the the harvest and packaging line inside Kalera in Aurora on May 19, 2022. Courtesy of Kalera

Source: Greeley Tribune