A Swedish food technology company, Plantagon, has released an office building design called "Plant Building", and plans to build such a magnificent indoor farm + office building in Linkoping, Sweden's Eastern Gotland County. Due to this farm's unique operating model, the urban farmers who cultivate here do not need to pay any gross rent at all, because the heat generated by the farm is enough to pay the amount.

The Plantagon Underground Farm, like other indoor farms, grows plants with LED lighting in the building. However, the difference between Plantagon is that the heat generated by lighting in the room is usually exhausted from the room to prevent plants from overheating. However, Plantagon directly collects the heat and stores it in the building's thermal energy storage system to assist the office building People stay warm in the cold winter.

The method for collecting heat energy in this underground farm is to use a water pipe above the LED lamp to save the heat energy in the water and then introduce it to the heat pump system. This thermal energy storage system will save the building 700,000 kilowatt-hours of energy annually, which is equivalent to saving 3 times the rent of the basement. In addition, the carbon dioxide produced in the office will be discharged to the farm, and fresh oxygen produced by the farm's fruits and vegetables will be returned to the office workers.

"The building operator agreed to let us pay rent for 3 years, so we don't need to pay any SEK for this basement at this time," said Hans Hassle, co-founder of Plantagon. Growing fruits and vegetables in the city must find new business models to make the food produced less expensive, "he said.

The heat and oxygen generated by the underground farm can be used by office workers in the same building (Image: Plantagon)

The company plans to sell fruits and vegetables directly to office workers in the same building, as well as two of the restaurants; about one-third of the output will be sold to neighboring grocery stores, and the transportation process is near, without using any petroleum fuel. ; The other one-third of the output will be sold in stores in the building.

"In Sweden, people are more interested in locally grown foods than organic foods," Hassle said. "People often want to know where food comes from."

Hassle added that if an organic lettuce is shipped from a place hundreds or even thousands of miles away to a store, its environmental footprint may be higher than that of a lettuce produced on a local indoor farm.

Plantagon plans to open 10 underground farms in Stockholm within the next three years, starting with buildings that already have underground heat pump systems. The preparatory team is also discussing with local energy companies the possibility of selling the remaining thermal energy to other buildings in the area.

In the city of Linkoping, a two-hour drive from Stockholm, the company is planning to expand its underground farm into a 16-story "plant skyscraper." In addition to the entire building to produce fruits and vegetables, 2/3 of the space will be rented for office use to maintain stable operations. This plan is expected to be implemented in 2020 or 2021.

Another similar indoor farm project at Plantagon will also be implemented in Singapore. In this country lacking cultivated land, most of the crops are imported from neighboring countries, such as Malaysia. When countries such as Malaysia have less and less irrigable land and more and more people, Singapore has begun to Plantagon, an urban farm that grows food, is interested. Similarly, in some cities in China where it is difficult to get enough food, cooperation with Plantagon has also begun.

The company is raising funds for FundedByMe to build its first farm. Hassle hopes that this plan will involve as many people as possible, not only because of financial factors, but also because he believes that every citizen needs to actively become a shareholder in urban agriculture.

"For us, food production is different from managing other businesses. Food is like water and is part of human rights," said Hassle. "So we have a greater social responsibility and a responsibility to the environment, which is why we actively invite people. The reason for owning some equity is that everyone should contribute. "