New York Sun Works

Where are you based?

New York City, USA.

What kind of organisation are you (eg. academic, business, NGO etc)?

We're a not-for-profit organization promoting engineering solutions designed to help cities achieve greater environmental sustainability. In particular we are involved with promoting the concept of sustainable urban agriculture. We believe that dense urban areas, can significantly cut their carbon emissions by growing more of their own food.

What is your broad area of expertise?

Our staff expertise is in the fields of environmental & ecological engineering, plant biology and environmental education.

Give a range of the projects you are you currently working on.

Our focus is on building integrated, food production systems. Put simply, the construction of hydroponic greenhouses on city buildings. We have several models in production, from the small-scale, education and food production facility for public schools to much larger, commercially viable urban farm systems. They all use hydroponic techniques to grow large amounts of food in an environmentally sustainable way, making best use of energy sources available from the host building or from the broader urban environment (e.g. wind, solar, biofuel, or waste heat recovery).

What aspect of your work with relevance to the food-climate change issue would you like to feature?  

We are trying to encourage people to look at the potential these forms of agricultural technique offer to the urban environment.

Modern farming feeds billions every day, but is the world's largest consumer of both land and water, the primary source of water pollution, and accounts for 15% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Fresh produce typically travels several thousands of miles to reach urban consumers, adding to traffic congestion, air pollution, and carbon emissions.

Building integrated farms, using modern, high-yield hydroponics may not be able to provide all a city's food needs, but it can provide a significant portion of its fresh perishable vegetables. Tomatoes, lettuces, peppers, cucumbers and the like, are frequently grown in large hydroponic farms somewhere out in the countryside. Frequently, however, they may not be even remotely close to the city, or even in the same country. Bringing the production of fresh, perishable vegetables into the city can deliver fresher, healthier produce and reduce significantly the carbon dioxide emissions otherwise associated with their transportation and cold storage.

Please describe the work in more detail - how it started, what stage it is at, who has/have been involved and their different roles.

Impressed with the high yields, water efficiency and low environmental impact of modern hydroponic techniques, our founder Dr Ted Caplow, was intrigued to find out whether these techniques could be made to work effectively in the middle of a dense, hectic city such as New York.

Aided by a team of environmental engineers and plant biologists, he designed and built the Science Barge. The Science Barge is a proto-type, sustainable urban farm. The 128 feet barge, features a greenhouse demonstrating recirculating hydroponics, and is powered by wind, solar and biofuels. The Science Barge grows tomatoes, cucumbers and lettuce on the banks of the Hudson River with zero net carbon emissions, zero chemical pesticides, and zero runoff.

During its inaugural 2007 season the Science Barge hosted over 10,000 visitors including over 3,000 New York school children. We also had the pleasure of discussing our vision of sustainable urban farming with representatives of more than 70 national and international newspapers and television stations.

We are now in discussion with a number of property developers, engineering companies, and architectural firms to take our concept one stage further. Our vision is to erect a range of rooftop urban farms in New York, London and other densely populated areas.

What do you see as the big questions for the food climate research community at the moment?

We need to significantly reduce the overall impact of agriculture on the environment. This involves reducing the amount of water wasted through traditional agricultural techniques, reducing pesticide use, and, of course, radically reducing the distance food is transported across the planet. Land fit for arable use is in high demand, the competition between food production, biofuel production and land reserved for trees (for C02 retention) will only increase. Using higher yield food production techniques, and bringing them into the city, wherever possible, can only help ease pressure on arable land.

What are the big questions you feel you are seeking to answer at the moment?

Buildings in the US account for 39% of total energy use, 12% of water consumption, and 38% of carbon dioxide emissions (figures for Europe are similar). Our urban farm projects use otherwise underused building surfaces; they capture rainwater, and use waste heat and renewable energy, to grow fresh vegetables in the middle of the city.  

Is there any expertise you feel you lack and would you welcome help/collaboration with others?

We work in collaboration with a wide range of public and private sector organizations and are always keen to hear news of potential new projects, building developments or initiatives in this and related areas .

What are your plans for the immediate future as regards this work?

We have some major projects in development in the US, UK, southern Europe and the Middle East. More information about these will surface in the media during 2008.

What are the insights / skills / data (big or small) you can offer to the rest of the research world on food and climate change?

We are always happy to disseminate scientific findings or general insights gained from our projects. The first body of collated data relating to the Science Barge's first season should be available midway through 2008. With this, we expect to have data available on the relative energy efficient and CO2 outputs of these systems compared with other traditional systems.

Contact details

Benjamin Linsley
Public Affairs Director
New York Sun Works
1841 Broadway, Suite 200
New York, NY 10023

blinsley@nysunworks.org
Tel: +1 212 757 7560

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