Industrial Symbiosis of Vertical Hydroponic Farming System at SweGreen

Abstract: The United Nations projects that by the year 2050, there will be as many as 9.7 billion people on earth (UN, 2019). Along with the world population growth, the demand for food production will be increased. On the other side, agriculture plays a crucial role in global warming, increasing food production challenges. Thus, more sustainable methods should be chosen to respond to population demand and decrease the impact of agricultural activities on climate change. One of these alternative methods is Urban farming, specifically hydroponic vertical farming, in which the food is produced indoors under exceptional conditions as using artificial lighting and less water. Hydroponic vertical farming has several benefits, higher production per area, a controlled environment, less land usage, less water consumption, etc.  Vertical farms use LEDs as lightning sources to help photosynthesis; LEDs produce a massive amount of excess heat, which will be released to the environment and impact global warming. Therefore, a solution should be found to use the excess heat for other purposes instead of releasing it into the environment. In this study, the environmental performance of SweGreen’s hydroponic vertical farm will be assessed using a Life cycle assessment. The SweGreen hydroponic farm is located in a basement of a host building in Stockholm, Sweden. There is a symbiotic network between the farm and the host building where the farm provides the building with excess heat produced from the LEDs and, in return, gains carbon dioxide from the building. The result of this study shows that symbiotic network can decrease the impact of agriculture and excess produced heat, where the required heat for the building will be replaced from district heating by the produced excess heat. The symbiotic development between the host building and the farm will benefit the farm in various aspects and highlights the importance of urban symbiosis to reduce the impacts.