New ways to make vertical farming stack up
dx7tnt responded with a most informative link: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=20905033" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=20905033</a><p>The “food miles” thing is insignificant nonsense; see notes&#x2F;strawberry-miles.html in <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;canonical.org&#x2F;~kragen&#x2F;dercuano-20190831.tar.gz" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;canonical.org&#x2F;~kragen&#x2F;dercuano-20190831.tar.gz</a>.<p>I&#x27;m dubious about the economics of the thing.<p>Let’s assume that the power source is solar.  The 84% energy loss of solar panels, followed by the 80% energy loss of LED lighting, works out to about 3% of the sunlight harvested getting to the plants. That&#x27;s a high price to pay for wavelength-shifting and time-shifting; it&#x27;s hard to see when this would be a better solution than skylights, lightpipes, and colored filters, maybe supplemented by LEDs or low-pressure sodium at night. (Except, I suppose, to avoid violent reprisals for cultivation somebody doesn&#x27;t like.)<p>If the power source is fossil fuels or nuclear energy, it makes even less economic sense, except at extreme latitudes like those of northern Scotland or Norway, because those energy sources are even more expensive.<p>In moderate latitudes with adequate civil rights, it would seem that the only reason for indoor cultivation with only or primarily artificial light would be an aesthetic taste for the artificial, like tailfins on 1950s cars or the bright blue LEDs on current shitty consumer electronics.