Starting a Farm in HDB?

[limsteel]

I came across a program on CableTV... can't remember Discovery, NatGeo... but it showed city will expand and finally merge into a super Megacity. To supply food will be a nightmare as farm land slowly urbanized.

Program shows multistorey building being built for agriculture purpose... this reduce cost of transportation, reliance on foreign import, etc...

Come to think of it. We already have these kind of building built all around. Our HDB multi storey carpark is the instant farm land. Since the top level is always empty, add a layer soil and fertiliser, or go Hydroponics, we can start growing veggie!

Senior Citizen might be able to work on them.

Workable? Foreseeable problem:
- No manpower, Sg people too pampered to be under the sun
- HDB ask operator to pay season parking. gauging 100 lots = $9000/mth (is it still worth it??)

[exotic_idiot]

I don't even think so far..? Maybe we won't even live that long till the super mega city era?

[Simon]

not that easy to convert existing rooftop for that purpose, there are some considerations like structural stability, maintenance (wear and tear).

when I was studying in NUS, we discuss about this topic, but the fact is existing buildings are not that cost efficient to convert as they are built to handle certain temporary loading and not static loading like earth/soil for such purpose

[limsteel]

Sad. maybe in future HDB will factor in the load for a roof top farm.

I was hoping to see space put to good use. can be a roof top park maybe with mostly bushy plants, ponds, run/walk track, etc...

[Simon]

Fret not, at the present moment, NUS is doing some trials on lightweight green roof testing on some of their buildings. Do a search on Green roof and you can find the extensive effort of many worldwide.

NTU has a design building that uses turfing as roofing material

[Jungle-mania]

You could do aeroponic, that can be done. It is way alot easier than soil based farming.

[Simon]

Actually, the key to growing greens on the roof tops has nothing to do with farming nor growing cash crops. It is more to reducing the greenhouse effect and like in Singapore, because of the densely populated areas especially in the Central Business District with buildings all tightly spaced together and with their Air-conditioning cooling towers, it creates what we known as the Heat Island effect or Urban heat island.

With greenery grown on rooftops, it helps cool not only the building, increases O2 output but also reduces on electricity consumption. Studies have shown that compared to areas outside the CBD has a reduction to max. temperature

[Shaihulud]

I think the concept is called http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical_farming, food being grown at each floor. Growing food just on the roof top, even on every building wouldn't produce enough food. I think the problem stated is reduced light saturation for every floor.