Assessment of the energy consumption of indoor farming for different climates and lighting system intensity

Abstract

Nowadays, due to the energy, water, and arable land crises, as well as the constant global population growth and urbanization, water, energy, and food sources are strongly linked to each other, and a comprehensive analysis including all the influencing factors has to be carried out. In this context, the need to improve the energy performance of traditional cultivation systems, as well as to develop alternative and innovative ones, is causing a shift in interest from greenhouses to indoor farming methods (such as vertical farms) in the agricultural sector. In fact, they allow for completely controlled crop production without the use of chemical pesticides. Moreover, their productivity is independent of external conditions and improved compared to traditional systems. However, their energy consumption is larger than that of greenhouses. To evaluate the techno-economic feasibility of such systems, a comprehensive model of a vertical farm, including air conditioning, lighting systems, and plant evapotranspiration, has been developed to quantify the energy share for the different elements of the system (air conditioning and lighting) and to relate the energy consumption to the kilogram of produced crop, analysing exclusively the growth phase. The analysis is carried out for different cities and considers different scenarios in terms of lighting and electricity costs.