Revol Greens, the largest greenhouse lettuce grower in North America, has unveiled the world’s single-largest controlled environment agriculture (CEA) lettuce facility. It boasts state-of-the-art technology which includes artificial intelligence tools to monitor and adjust climate control, irrigation, and energy management for maximum output and efficiency 365 days a year. The newly erected greenhouse is expected to create 130 jobs in Texas while significantly expanding Revol Green’s distribution in the US state and the central and southern United States. With the addition of this new facility, Revol Greens has extended its reach to over 70 percent of the US market when…
Author: Matt Peskett
Matt Peskett
Matt has worked in digital publishing and media for over two decades across the science, technology, food and agricultural sectors. With a lifelong passion for growing his own food, Matt also produces 300kg giant pumpkins for exhibition and volunteers with the Royal Horticultural Association. He has a sizeable horticultural social media presence and has been a finalist in the Garden Media Guild's blog of the year and social media awards. Matt also dabbles as an individual investor in agritech start-ups like Small Robot Company and Drone Ag.
With its unique 3D vertical architecture in place, alongside dozens of patent assets, US firm Plenty says its newly opened farm is the most technologically advanced indoor vertical farm in the world. Based in Compton, California, the new farm will deliver an industry-leading yield of up to 350 times the yield per acre of a conventional farm. It is forecast to grow up to 4.5M pounds (2M kg) of produce annually to supply partners including Bristol Farms, Walmart and Whole Foods Market. “After investing nearly a decade into research and development, Plenty has cracked the code on a scalable platform…
Founded in 2011, GoodLeaf Farms is the largest vertical farming company in Canada. Its microgreens and baby greens are available in most leading retailers in Ontario and sold in more than 600 locations. The business has now secured a CA$78 million syndicated debt financing from CIBC and Farm Credit Canada (FCC) to support the growth and expansion of its network of indoor farms across Canada. New farms in Calgary and Montreal will add 200,000 square feet of production to GoodLeaf’s capacity, each able to produce approximately two million pounds of locally grown, fresh leafy greens each year. The completion of…
Lufa Farms, a company dedicated to creating a more direct and local food system, has announced the opening of its first indoor farm. Located in the Saint-Laurent borough of Montreal, Canada, the former Sears headquarters have been transformed into a unique urban food ecosystem that combines the world’s largest rooftop greenhouse, a distribution centre, and now a new indoor farm to feed thousands of customers each week. Featuring the Green Automation technology that is typically used in greenhouses, this urban farm is equipped with a single-level hydroponic growing system and a thousand energy-efficient LED lights. The site is designed to…
They were already working together but now Siemens Netherlands and Infinite Acres, the technology company of 80 Acres Farms, are one step closer to building a vertical farming Field-Lab and Experience Centre in The Hague, featuring Siemens technology and services. The two companies have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in which they agreed to jointly open a multi-part research centre at Infinite Acres’ headquarters in The Hague. In this research centre, the companies will integrate Siemens’ state-of-the-art hardware and software with Infinite Acres’ operating platform and controlled environment growing technology, as well as learnings from Infinite Acres research and development…
DK-Bell Holding Company is a family investment office that seeks to make long-term, strategic investments in Food & Agritech and, more specifically, controlled environment agriculture (CEA). Now the Private investment firm has come to the rescue of North American vertical farming company Farm.One. In 2021, hydroponic indoor farming company Farm.One expanded to a 10,000 sq. ft. indoor facility in downtown Brooklyn to meet growing crop demand generated by hundreds of new members across New York City but in early 2022 it was not able to raise much-needed growth capital and had to close its Brooklyn farm. DK-Bell recognised the company…
Australasian based vertical farming business Greengrower has begun operations at its first farm in Hamilton, New Zealand with patented proprietary technology powered by Elevate Farms Inc. The Farm is the first of its kind in Australasia featuring a fully autonomous grow room with product already available at local grocery stores on the North Island, one of the two main islands of New Zealand. The Farm produces over 4,000 bags for retail distribution daily from its current site, with plans underway for further expansion of this capacity. Tom Schuyt, CEO of Greengrower, said “We are proud to bring sustainably…
Foresight Group, a sustainability-led alternative investment manager, has reached an agreement with Harvest London, a UK-based controlled environment agriculture company, to aid the expansion of the vertical farming industry. Founded in 2017 by Matt Chlebek and Chris Davies, Harvest London opened its first, proof-of-concept farm, in Walthamstow in 2018. After crowdfunding through Seedrs, the company opened its second farm in Leyton in late 2020. According to Sky News, the vertical farm start-up has successfully transformed a £500,000 loan received from the government’s Future Fund into equity shares. Harvest London is a B Corporation, having gone through a rigorous accreditation process…
Silvia Booij and Leonie Geerdinck, researchers at Signify Research in the Netherlands, have been testing LED light recipes in basil cultivation and they have reached an outcome matching similar experiments with other crops. As with previous light measuring studies conducted at Wageningen, using lettuce, tomato and spinach plants, white light does not add any value to Basil plants themselves. Indeed compared to red and blue light, white LEDs only increase energy consumption costs. This may come as no major surprise, in my own use of LED grow lights I found long ago that red and blue LED grow lights made…
Vertical farming company iFarm is constructing a high-tech vertical farm in the new and innovative community of Nuanu, Indonesia. Located on the Balinese coastline, Nuanu is a collaboration of creative minds living and working together to develop a sustainable ecosystem. iFarm and the Nuanu community are inviting architects to submit designs for the new futuristic farm, a core feature of Nuanu’s drive for functional green practices. The design of the facility should align with the eco-friendly biometric architecture style of Nuanu, whether it’s GreenZen or Naturatecture, with the winning design constructed on site. Launching at the end of 2023, the…
