Looking for help in economics of hydroponic farming

[Ras]

Hi everybody,
I am engineer, "accidentally" (not expert, but so happens...) involved in design of commercial hydroponic farm.
Using extrapolations and assumptions from some publications, i have prepared a table for calculation of costs and profits for required farm.
I would like to discuss / to check my estimations with somebody who knows about that subject more than I.
If you are willing to help- I will send you my Excel table.
Thank you in advance, very appreciate if you could hep me.

 

[Dave645]

Hi everybody,
I am engineer, "accidentally" (not expert, but so happens...) involved in design of commercial hydroponic farm.
Using extrapolations and assumptions from some publications, i have prepared a table for calculation of costs and profits for required farm.
I would like to discuss / to check my estimations with somebody who knows about that subject more than I.
If you are willing to help- I will send you my Excel table.
Thank you in advance, very appreciate if you could hep me.

Ok while you may get a response from the person your looking for It may help if you elaborate on the basic design.
Glass house, or big indoor shed with artificial lights.
24/7 lighting or not.
Temp control or not, sealed environment or not.
One big hidden cost in any system is disease, and with any mono cropping system of any type of plant it’s, Plan for what happens when diseases get in, this can be moderated with simple rotation of crops but it only works if the crops don’t share common diseases with each other.

the other common overlooked cost is The power requirements, I would fit solar Electric if possible, especially if you’re an indoor set up and going for 24/7 operation you can get time of use tariffs which make night electric cheap so solar Can cover at least your day time costs.
If your heating them again solar thermal can be a big plus even in winter you can get good heat from roof solar even in winter.
another route if using glass houses would be air circulation into under ground ducting to move Heat into the slab of the green houses from the hot air that collects in the peaks of the buildings. This reduces venting and retains day time heat
Within the ground or concrete slab. Which can then reduce your heating night time needs.

This isn’t the video I was looking for but it has similar points.
Good design can reduce Long term operational costs.
Managing energy is very important when trying to make anything profitable.
any trick that works passively should be incorporated in the design if possible.
and the use of solar electrical, or solar anything to power the solutions should be considered. Solar thermal can be quite cheap to install.

Good luck With it.

 

[Ras]

Ok while you may get a response from the person your looking for It may help if you elaborate on the basic design.
Glass house, or big indoor shed with artificial lights.
24/7 lighting or not.
Temp control or not, sealed environment or not.

Dave645 Thank you for reply.
Currently I am talking about indoor house with artificial lights 16 hours/day and automatic control with sealed environment. As a prototype for my estimations I took this https://www.researchgate.net/public...an_Endeavor_for_Sustainable_Urban_Agriculture
The only reason for that selection is a lot of information provided in this article, and for my preFEED evaluation of project this approach is sufficient.
Yes, the prototype project include sanitation and disease control costs, and huge bills for electricity- biggest part of OPEX costs. This is one of my questions, indeed.
If you like - I can send you a file with my calculations.
Thanks again.

 

[Flat 10]

Is it for weed? I heard that was the most profitable hydroponic crop ?

 

[Ras]

No. At the moment I run it for lettuce or cherry tomato. But this is just for verification of design- actual crop TBD.

 

[Storeman]

Be careful anyone excepting a file from an unknown source

 

[Ras]

Be careful anyone excepting a file from an unknown source

Is it restricted here to add a link? I did not know that...

 

[Clive]

Is it restricted here to add a link? I did not know that...

yes, for virus and hacking security the file type you can upload here is restricted

Send me the file and I will take a look, it's an area I have been looking at a bit recently

clive AT twbfarms.co.uk

 

[Ras]

yes, for virus and hacking security the file type you can upload here is restricted
Send me the file and I will take a look, it's an area I have been looking at a bit recently

Hi Clive
Thank you very much for your help!

 

[Dave645]

Dave645 Thank you for reply.
Currently I am talking about indoor house with artificial lights 16 hours/day and automatic control with sealed environment. As a prototype for my estimations I took this https://www.researchgate.net/public...an_Endeavor_for_Sustainable_Urban_Agriculture
The only reason for that selection is a lot of information provided in this article, and for my preFEED evaluation of project this approach is sufficient.
Yes, the prototype project include sanitation and disease control costs, and huge bills for electricity- biggest part of OPEX costs. This is one of my questions, indeed.
If you like - I can send you a file with my calculations.
Thanks again.

I had a quick look at your link it’s as I expected energy is a big factor, that and the LED lights do slowly Drop there light output over time So need replacing.

Indoor With full artificial light, seems on paper to be very expensive, When your ignoring free energy from the sun in the design there needs to be a good reason for it.
It’s likely the over heat risk in air and environmentally sealed systems. You can go for adjustable shading or geothermal heat dumping which can work nicely with ground source heat pumps, to provide your heating when needed.
or is the project looking for a small foot print design which also limits the design for even light distribution. So it ends up running on LED lighting for consistency.
in any design program you have to look at the cost of the final product and the current cost of production with more traditional glass house systems. There has to be a margin for the extra setup costs. I can see that the setup you shared the link to, had done just that.
I will note in farming, in general, price Volatility due to supply and demand can shift prices below the cost of production if one market or another is over supplied especially with Perishable produce, with any crop it’s likley at certain times of the year that indoor produce will and can be undercut by traditional glass house systems, even if that’s only at set times of the year. So you may have to look at the crops prices during the year and time production down time into these over supply price lows. Or switch production to crops still out of season.
It’s just another good reason for the initial design to take maximum control of the energy requirements the project may need, with good design.
maybe this would also help.

https://physicsworld.com/a/new-generator-creates-electricity-directly-from-heat/

generate electric from your waste heat on sunny days.
When I said geothermal heat exchange my house uses a in ground pipe, to cool incoming air the same type of thing can be used to cool air in a sealed system the Benefit is That same heat you dump can reduce your night time heating demands.


https://www.rehau.com/gb-en/homeown... saving additional heating and cooling costs!
Mine was this, it cools my incoming air but it could be used to cool a sealed systems air. Even on hot days incoming air is only 12-14 degrees Or be part of a filtered air system.
Good luck with it.

 

[Ras]

Indoor With full artificial light, seems on paper to be very expensive, When your ignoring free energy from the sun in the design there needs to be a good reason for it.

Yes, there is a reason to ignore sunlight- there are not glass roof, only windows. Direct sun will cower only 10-15% of required, so conservatively i ignored it at the moment.

The idea of seasonal crop to benefit from fluctuation of prices is interesting- thank you. Need to think about how to use it.

Thank you for links- very interesting and new idea for me. Need to think about if I can use it.
I am living in tropics, so more need of cooling than heating, but idea still may be useful!

 

[Ras]

@DarkKnight00

Sorry?

 

[SRRC]

If they will let you in have a look at https://www.thanetearth.com/
Much of the tech is common.

 

[Yale]

@Ras Rastafarian..........

......

......I’ll get my coat.

 

[Ras]

If they will let you in have a look at https://www.thanetearth.com/
Much of the tech is common.

Thanks, I will try to contact them!

 

[Ras]

@Ras Rastafarian..........

.......I’ll get my coat.

Not my case!☺

 

[Ras]

Hi Clive
Thank you very much for your help!

Hi Clive.
Did you receive my email?