They’re growing tomatoes hydroponically in disused parts of the London underground, which is really cool. Combating food waste is also really important – it’s estimated we throw away a third of the food produced for humans, which is both ridiculous and sad.

I think that for this article, they are correctly asserting that organic vs nonorganic fertilizer makes little difference to the environment when it comes to an aerogarden. It’s more nuanced than this article gets into, but the gist is there.

I think the bigger impact is having a reliable source of vegetables that can be grown in an apartment or urban area. The sourcing for the electronics and plastics are a big hurdle to get over the carbon foot print. Still, if you look at the amount of energy it takes to transport the produce, transport the labor and the amount of waste in that process, you’d get close if not surpass the carbon efficiency of big agriculture. Of course if you have the ability to use renewable energy sources like solar or wind to power the garden, it’d be a big step towards overcoming mass production efficiency.

Thanks so much for explaining. The UK was all set to ban glyphosates but now it’s approved for use until 2025, though a lot of local councils have banned it. Monsanto also invented DDT! Well done guys!

I grew a tremendous volume of tomatoes in raised beds using homemade compost, watering with aquarium water and occasionally emptying the contents of the aquarium filter on there.

Salt-based nutrients are not only environmentally hazardous because of runoff from use, but also from production. Regardless of how much you’re using, the runoff from production will cause pollution.

Secondly, Miracle-Gro is the exclusive distributor of Roundup. If you don’t understand how Monsanto is terrible for the environment, look into monoculture farming, and how it caused the dust bowl.

Thirdly, to attack organic farming as a whole is quite a bad faith argument. You can absolutely source salt-based minerals from organic sources for farming; however, farmers who really care about organic food don’t use these fertilizers. I successfully pull crops out of my raised beds every year using just compost and compost tea. Every once in a while I add some fish poop for microbes and nitrogen. No salts.