Abstract
Food deserts have emerged as sources of urban crises around the world. The lack of access to healthy food has rendered health inequities that have been made more visible by the devastating effects of COVID-19 on the populations experiencing food insecurity and healthy food access. Research is posed to fight food deserts through innovation and technology; specifically, through the development of corner store grocery markets with integrated agricultural greenhouses in such a way as to both provide access to healthy foods at reasonable cost to better meet nutritional needs, and significantly reduce operating costs. The posed technology includes a combined heat and power (CHP) system to reduce overall energy costs by meeting the partial electric and thermal loads required within the store and the connected greenhouse. A mathematical model is developed to control the operation of the CHP system and to dispatch the generated electric power to the store and the thermal energy to the greenhouse to minimize overall energy requirements. The model is applied to an ambient environment representing a heating-dominant climate. Results indicate the potential to reduce operating costs by 55% in a heating-dominant climate.
Highlights
The fact is that corner markets are already in these places
We focus on utilizing technology to address simultaneously two of the barriers to healthy food options in corner markets, namely, the barriers associated with higher operating costs and providing financially viable access to healthy food
For heating-dominated climates, we propose a model for a corner market with an integrated greenhouse to provide year-round access to locally grown food, leveraging a combined heat and power system (CHP) to reduce overall energy costs by meeting the partial thermal and electric loads required within the store and the connected greenhouse integration system
Summary
Large grocers have abandoned these areas all over the United States, leaving residents of low-income communities with no access to affordable and healthy food options. The extent of this problem is huge. A 2012 USDA study revealed a far worse situation, where 23 million people lacked access to healthy food options [1] Another USDA report in 2019 showed again an escalation of the problem [3]. In Chicago, minorities in poor neighborhoods have no access to nearby supermarkets as well Residents of these neighborhoods have to travel far to get to healthy food markets compared to white neighborhoods. With the spread of COVID-19 and having one or more chronic diseases, this put people living in food deserts at higher risk of severe illness
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