“It’s a real luxury to eat locally grown, leafy greens in the middle of a Chicago winter,” declares Robert Colangelo, founder and CEO of Green Sense Farms. Before he launched his business in 2012, the only truly feasible way to provide fresh salads and herbs during the cold Illinois winter was to truck them thousands of miles from farms in the warmer southern US states.
However, Colangelo has no ordinary farm. Inside a warehouse a few miles east of Chicago, his ‘vertical farm’ contains rows of tightly packed plants, stacked from floor to ceiling. Bathed in a bluey-pink LED light, the vertical farm principally grows salads, herbs and starter crops, while also constantly experimenting with new plants. Green Sense Farms, which is in the process of building new installations and selling its technology worldwide, mostly supplies a local Whole Foods Market distribution plant, as well as nearby restaurants.
Colangelo’s farm offers benefits beyond producing basil in winter. He is able to intensively grow his crops within 30-35 days and constantly send these to his customers – far more regularly and dependably than growing the same crops in a field. The warehouse attracts few pests and, because the environment is entirely controlled, the company uses significantly less water than traditional farming, while avoiding the need for pesticides.
Farms like Colangelo’s offer a tantalising vision for the future of farming. They allow for faster, more efficient growing, significantly less waste and the ability to produce crops near or even within cities – where most plants are now consumed. This potential revolution is, above all, powered by LEDs.