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Vertical Farming

damninteresting.com — At humankind's current rate of growth, it is estimated that by the year 2050, the planet will be host to three billion more people than it is today. Yet at present, over 80% of the planet's arable land is already in use, which leaves one to wonder how such a large number of people will be fed.

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  • sachleen, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1WOAH cool
  • adml_shake, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4soylent green, thats all i'm saying.
  • tomscott, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0damn you beat me to the soylent green comment :)
  • x2dx, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2Id get me one of them to grow alot of weed.
  • Odo08, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6"Experts" have been sounding the alarm for over 50 years that we will not be able to feed ourselves. Time and time again they have been proven wrong. Hunger is and has been a function of transportation, war and corrupt governments, not the inability of farmers to grow enough food.

    As as a farmer and rancher, I'd like to see a little more scarcity. Maybe I could make my next loan payment.
  • AttroPheed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1we can all do our part to help future generations by not having kids and dying young!
  • mEEks99, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yet at present, over 80% of the planet's arable land is already in use, which leaves one to wonder how such a large number of people will be fed.

    So...UHM...from now untill 2050 people are not going to die? We have nothing to worry about. There will just be more McDonalds!!!!
  • Brak710101, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0When this generation dies, aka 6 BILLION people... Where we will bury them all?
  • FlyingAvatar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Also population growth estimates are usually wrong, because as population becomes too dense, growth rates naturally decline.
  • waylandchin, on 10/12/2007, -4/+1We are all going to have to become vegetarians. Since raising livestock consumes so much energy. www.peta.org
  • TetrisKid, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Actually we are on the verge of global de-population. China currently has a ratio of almost 3:1 males to females under the age of 30. Italy, Japan, Germany, and many other 1st world countries are no longer reproducing at 2.1 (the optimal level needed for replacement). Drastic population bubble coming.
  • dargon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The problem isn't that we're using 80% of earths arable land already, the problem is that a) we use it inefficiently and b) what food we do produce is largely wasted.
  • fanboy00, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0Kevin rose just dugg this!!
  • puny_midget, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The article assumes 2200 calories/person...seems a little short to me though. I'm no expert but that number should be somewhere around 3000-4000, depending whether they're active or not.
  • selmo, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0Has anyone tried the new teriyaki flavored kelp jerky? It really adds zest to the Plankton flavored sea-ramen.
  • Fantt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3It's funny when people talk about what's going to happen by 2050. Those predictions almost always assume that technology and everything else will remain the same as it is today. That won't happen. Technology is accelerating at an exponential rate. Given sufficiently advanced technology our planet's existing resources can feed and house billions more humans in a very comfortable way. The primary culprits causing poverty in the world today is political and religious in nature. Corrupt politicians who steal and siphon away aid money and prevent positive economic reforms and corrupt religious leaders who keep their followers ignorant and breeding at a level inconsistent with economic realities.

    Bucky showed that we have more than sufficient technology to feed the world's people (and house them and bring them safe water and electricity) but we lack the political will.
  • HowitZer21, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I don't think these guys know jack about population. Where are these 3 billion people going to come from?

    China is becoming less, the US is becoming less, Russia is becoming less all due to the basic idea of demographic transition theory. As countries modernize, life becomes more expensive, survival rates go way up due to disease control and we don't need children to survive anymore. Some countries population are growing a lot because they have disease control but the other factors are lagging. I doubt this lag will be long enough for the population to increase by 3 billion. That's just my opinion, but everything else I said is pretty much accepted knowledge. People don't breed uncontrollably. This has already been shown in history. Malthus is wrong; people can control their breeding.
  • MikeZila, on 10/12/2007, -4/+0fanboy said "Kevin rose just dugg this!!"


    Holy *****! Jump! Dance! Alert the Internets! Call the President! The National Guard!
  • bloodguard, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Mariculture. There's a whole lot of ocean out there to exploit.
  • bsoric, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0This reminds me of a Far Side comic. Some farmer had "Stackable Livestock"- piles of chickens all stacked vertically in one corner, cows in another, etc.
  • SirThom, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Yet at present, over 80% of the planet's arable land is already in use."

    If we mean it's in use by people, the whole world's population can fit in Texas with each person taking up 1,000+ square feet. Hrmph.

    I've got Google to back me up. http://www.google.com/search?q=world%27s+population+in+texas
  • silentmand, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0The year 2,010 AD: 6,823 Million people
    2,020 AD: 7,518 Million people
    2,030 AD: 8,140 Million people
    2,040 AD: 8,668 Million people
    2,050 AD: 9,104 Million people
    .....
    2,060 AD: 1.2 Million people...

    Isaac Newton said that there would be a huge population drop in 2060.... so don't worry about the land.. :-)
  • Stopher, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0We'll just eat kelp from the giant ocean farms.
  • frankjmattia, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0oh god, oh god, what are we going to do! now we're gonna have to actually put that 80% to use! Odo08 is right. scarcity of food is complete ***** - hunger is a function of war, corrupt goverments and transportation. then again - if everyone was well fed the population would probably go up even faster... ***** it. i say we just start praying for more natural disasters and having the earth take care of population control. its all good, i live in jersey - not even god and satan want to come to this ***** - and i wouldnt have it any other way.
    new jersey is dead, long live new jersey.
  • thetorbjorn, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1"We are all going to have to become vegetarians. Since raising livestock consumes so much energy. www.peta.org"

    please die, dick
  • 1b1d1ot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0so instead of getting stored food energy directly, they are going to take energy from the sun with solar panels then convert it back to light to give it plants?

    The building takes energy to build, add up the energy it takes to build no to mention transport water and nutrients for the plants. water weight a lot, lifting it up cost a lot.

    Is that prime ocean view space that building is standing on? Let me see should i build luxury apts or commodity food?

    any way fast tracked kudos all around.
  • CHurst, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0To HowitZer21 - The DTM has abosolutely nothing to do with what you have mentioned.
  • skooma, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Malthus? Is that you?
  • porplem, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Billion people.
  • Seumas, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1"we can all do our part to help future generations by not having kids and dying young!"

    Of course, you'll be undermined by the religious retards who have 15 kids and are still squeezing them out.
  • clevershark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Soylent Cola: it varies from person to person.
  • clevershark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0>we can all do our part to help future generations by not having kids and dying young!<

    Fair enough. You start.
  • Ruckgesicht, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0OIL OIL OIL

    Who the heck cares about food when the problem of oil is staring us in the face? Without some kind of alternative, those 3 extra billion people won't exist. In fact, the population would decline, and how.
  • m1t0s1s, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Why not solve the greed problem first, with so many storehouses in africa (for example) filled with food while those countries have starving children.

    50 billion people imprisoned to miserable jobs just to survive. Sheesh.
  • JigsawJesus, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0


  • bluefire0728, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Cool concept.

    On a side note though, there is way too much emphasis on population explosions and not being able to feed ourselves because of large populations. But let's think about this for a second. Today, there are over 6 billion people, but only a small top percentage of the people on earth consume the highest percentage of resources (first world countries).

    So maybe we should be concentrating more on how much we are consuming rather than how big the population will be.
  • clevershark, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1>We are all going to have to become vegetarians. Since raising livestock consumes so much energy. www.peta.org<

    Either that, or make it legal to eat members of PETA. The food supply will surely grow if we come to accept "the other other white meat."
  • citrusfizz, on 10/12/2007, -7/+0













































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































  • Fantt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"OIL OIL OIL

    Who the heck cares about food when the problem of oil is staring us in the face? Without some kind of alternative, those 3 extra billion people won't exist. In fact, the population would decline, and how."

    HYDROGEN SOLAR WIND NUCLEAR SHALE NANOTUBES ETC ETC ETC

    We have lots of alternatives - just not a lot of "as cheap" alternatives. Yet.
  • citrusfizz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0lol it worked
    sorry wont do it again
  • haxr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"...the planet will be host to three billion more people than it is today."

    Can't we just setup a cluster and load balance it?
  • superal1394, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0That thing is soo cool, i saw it on Discovery awhile ago. The population will balance out before it gets to that level though; thats if Africa becomes fully developed but continues to produce at the current rate.

    Would kinda suck tryin to keep track of 9 billion people anyway.
  • thidranki, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Cool? yes
    Going to happen? no
  • Kiltak, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Something will happen to control the number of human being on earth, Disease, war,... nature will take care of it.

    Kiltak
    Merry Christmas from http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com
  • Dragular, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I think you guys have failed to remember that the bird flu is going to kill us all so we won't have to worry about it. ;)
  • cosmotic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Link to the article, not your blog
  • vypergts, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0NEWSFLASH: People starving in 2005/6, THE FUTURE IS NOW!

    "About 24,000 people die every day from hunger or hunger-related causes. This is down from 35,000 ten years ago, and 41,000 twenty years ago." - TheHungerSite.com
  • VelvetoneFusion, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1$5 says it's in the next SimCity....
  • jayf, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Even if governments lose their corruption and we find some miracle way to distribute all the supposedly extra food we have when the oil gets too expensive there'll be no way to distribute bananas under $10 a bunch.

    The rich will get richer, the poor will begin to stink and die and the birds will eat their corpses, get sick themselves and spread their filthy diseases to the healthy.

    We will all live in a Mad-max world where the only good news is there'll be no Mel Gibson.
  • specter85, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"About 24,000 people die every day from hunger or hunger-related causes. This is down from 35,000 ten years ago, and 41,000 twenty years ago." - TheHungerSite.com"

    Stop sending them food and send them U-HAUL'S so they can move to where the food is!!
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