Rooftop greenhouses make produce hyperlocal
BROOKLYN, N.Y. — Against the slate skyline of downtown Manhattan, across the East River, 20,000 square feet of vibrant green plants pop up from a rooftop in Park Slope.
On top of a Whole Foods store here, Gotham Greens has turned what CEO Viraj Puri calls a "vastly underutilized piece of real estate" into a year-round production facility for fresh produce.
In perhaps the country's most urban landscape, Gotham wants to make fresh food hyperlocal and highly accessible. The company only grows plants that typically have to travel thousands of miles to reach the city — inside the greenhouse basil, tomatoes, bok choy, arugula, baby kale, and butterhead lettuce grow in neat rows.
Gotham, which Puri says has been profitable since launching its first greenhouse in 2011 on the roof of a warehouse in Greenpoint, also sells everything it grows to local grocers, restaurants, and specialty markets like Dean and Deluca.
A quarter goes to the Whole Foods downstairs. The grocery company known for its selection of organic items and sprawling produce section was one of Gotham's first customers in 2011. The two companies decided to work together on Gotham's second location because their "company missions aligned," Puri says.
Puri's hopes to expand Gotham Greens to other cities soon. He's currently scouting possible locations and may be announcing them later this year.
"It makes these cities more self-sufficient," he says. "We're providing access to fresh produce in an urban environment and doing it on a commercial scale."
This greenhouse started running in January. Gotham leases the roof from Whole Foods. The partnership also means that the time from when an item is picked to when a customer buys it in the store could be just a few hours. The average grocery store item travels about 3,000 miles from the farm to the shelf, Puri says.
"Some herbs that people eat here in New York even get flown in from places as far away as Israel," Puri says. Gotham's method provides people "with a much more fresh, nutritious, and flavorful product."
Gotham also uses a technique called controlled environment agriculture, which essentially means that you don't have to wait until summer to pick up a bunch of locally grown, fresh basil. Gotham is able to stabilize the greenhouse in order to grow fresh produce year-round, despite weather conditions.
Sensors in the greenhouse track the environment, including light, temperature, and carbon dioxide levels, and feed the information to a computer control system that's been programmed to turn equipment on or off –for example, opening or closing the windows in the greenhouse – in order to maintain the ideal growing conditions for the plants.
Raising its plants on a roof instead of in the ground, Gotham found a way around another hazard of urban agriculture: basically, lack of dirt.
"Cities don't have quality soil," Puri says. So Gotham uses a technique known as hydroponics, which relies solely on water to provide plants with nutrients. Tiny tubes that feed into the plastic beds where the plants grow deliver a constant stream of recycled water, laced with a proprietary blend of nutrients like nitrogen, calcium, and potassium. The combination of nutrients is different for each plant.
"We're reducing the environmental footprint of agriculture," Puri says. "We use less land, we use less water...we're reducing energy use, not using any sort of chemical pesticides. It's not only a better product for the consumer but a better product for the planet."
Let's Eat! with Hadley Malcolm is a video franchise about how we source, cook, and eat our food in a time of growing appreciation for local ingredients and sustainable practices in the kitchen.