More Factory Vegetable Production - from Toshiba now

Toshiba has converted one of its former semiconductor plants in Yokosuka, Japan into a vegetable farm with the aim of producing 3 million bags of vegetables a year.

Shipment of the first crop of vegetables from the clean room farm is scheduled for the end of October 2014.

Toshiba’s says its closed-type plant factory uses state-of-the-art technology to raise crops and operates under almost aseptic conditions. Crops being grown in the idle semiconductor factory include leaf lettuce, baby leaf greens, spinach, mizuna and herbs.

The diversification into agriculture could bring in 300 million yen [ 3 million A$ approx] of income for Toshiba in vegetable sales.

Toshiba is utilising the existing cleanroom infrastructure in its plant factories to grow the vegetables in close to sterile conditions. By minimising the presence and thus the damage caused by germs, Toshiba says its crops have an extended period of freshness and shelf life.

The factory is equipped with a wide range of technologies and know-how from across the Toshiba Group, including fluorescent lighting with an output wavelength optimised for vegetable growth; air-conditioning systems that maintain constant temperature and moisture level; remote monitoring systems to track growth; and sterilisation systems for packing materials.

Toshiba is also using a production management system based on that used for its semiconductor device production.

While this is some new news, similar efforts are also underway in Singapore as well as other parts of Japan to grow vegetables indoors.

Will this approach to technology continue to be a major new direction for vegetable production particularly where and is more limited, or there are potential issues with a need for clean production?

Could this be used for a range of crops including melons and smaller fruited crops such as zucchinis?   An interesting conundrum given the current disease issues facing the crop in some parts of the world, including Australia? 

World's Tallest Green Wall - It Is Awesome!

tallest indoor living wall

Green Over Gray just completed the world's tallest living wall in the new Desjardins building in Quebec. The 65 metre (213 foot) living wall is named "The Currents" and was inspired by the nearby St. Lawrence River.

With more than 11,000 individual plants and 42 different plant species, this super tall vertical garden works hard to improve indoor air quality and create a unique environment for employees and visitors to the building.


   

“According to our research, this living wall is the tallest indoor vertical garden in the world,” said Patrick Poiraud, co-founder of Green Over Grey.

“The wall is fully hydroponic (i.e. soil-free) and incorporates plants that thrive in similar vertical environments found in nature, such as on tree branches and next to waterfalls. The end result is a visually pleasing piece that provides cleaner indoor air and improves both the acoustic and the value of the property.”

The vertical garden’s design is directly inspired by the St. Lawrence River, which can be seen from the building at its location in Lévis. Swirling currents of water are recreated in the layout of the wall with different shades of green, yellow, crimson, purple and cream along with different textures of the plants. Plant species include philodendrons, monsteras, fig trees, ginger, snake plants (Sansevieria trifasciata), elkhorn ferns (Platycerium bifurcatum), scheffleras, clusias and banana plants. The living wall provides a pleasant indoor environment and works to remove toxins and purify the air with plants like the peace lily, which is one of the most effective oxygen-producing plants.

Plants are grown in soil-free hydroponic panels made from 100 per cent recycled materials that eliminate 1.5 metric tons of recycled water bottles and plastic bags from landfills. The 15-story living wall is located on the north side of the new Desjardins building in a daylight-filled atrium. 

The eco-friendly building is expected to be completed later in September 2014 and was designed to achieve LEED Gold certification.

The tallest one I had personally seen was in Singapore - about 8 stories tall - but this is considerably higher.

I hope they have their maintenance ideas well sorted out, as that might be a bit tricky!! 

[ partially sourced from Outdoor Design Source May 2014]

New Red LED to Boost Greenhouse Horticulture Production

SIEMENS subsidiary Osram Opto Semiconductors has developed a powerful LED for use in plant cultivation.

The new LED emits a deep-red light at a wavelength of 660 nanometers, the ideal light for plant photosynthesis. The LED has an efficiency of 37%, which is one of the highest for a light source of this colour, and yields considerable energy savings compared to conventional lamps. 5000 of the new LEDs were used in a pilot project in Denmark to illuminate a cultivation area of several thousand square meters.

The trial saw power consumption in the greenhouse fall by 40%.

According to Siemens, relatively little of the light used by plants for their growth is from the visible light spectrum. Chlorophyll molecules mostly absorb deep-red and blue light for the purposes of photosynthesis. The efficient red LED from Osram Opto Semiconductors has an emission curve that is very closely matched to the spectral sensitivity of chlorophyll. The new LED is based on the thin-film technology used for high power semiconductor chips.

In greenhouse cultivation, some plants are grown on several levels stacked on top of one another. For this reason, the new LED is available in two variants, each with a different beam angle. The Golden Dragon Plus has a beam angle of 170 degrees and is well suited for use in reflector lamps for illuminating large areas under cultivation. The Oslon SSL LED, with a beam angle of 80 degrees, is designed for use in multi-level applications, such as those for the cultivation of lettuce.

Using LED light, it is also possible to promote different growth phases of the plant under cultivation. Red light, for example, encourages plants to grow in length, whereas blue light fosters bud formation. Controlled variation of the proportion of blue light between ten and 30 percent can reduce the use of fertilizer and other chemicals.

The developers claim that compared to conventional high-pressure sodium lamps, the luminous efficacy of the system as a whole is 60% higher with red and blue LEDs. The diodes have a service life of 100,000 hours for maintenance-free operation for many years.

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This sounds pretty interesting for greenhouse growers, especially in higher latitudes where daylength and daylight is severely restricted in winter months. Even if only partially as effective as claimed.

As an aside.........I am sure that hydroponic marijuana growers will also find an exciting use for the technology too! [I am not advocating its use] Reports seem to indicate they usually apply the latest and greatest technology.