When the soil of city is too much polluted to grow fresh vegetables, there may be another way to practice urban farming. In the farming region of Bujama (in Lima, Peru), the river water used for
irrigation is so polluted with metals for example lead, arsenic and
cadmium, that the majority of the fresh fruits and vegetables grown are contaminated.
The engineering students from Lima's University of Engineering and Technology
(UTEC) decided to solve this problem with the help of billboard that doubles as
both a more sustainable and healthier solution to the problem of crop
production in Bujama, and a nifty advertisement for their university.
This device ‘Air Orchard’ has been fitted with 10
dehumidifiers, which filters the water from air into a drip irrigation
system that's linked to an urban farm on the ground below. In just
one week of operation, the Air Orchard has produced 2,448 fresh heads of
lettuce, that are not only free from pollution.
"The technology has a number of filters that purify the water and keep it clean," Ignacio Montero, director of business innovation at UTEC, told Adele Peters at Fast Company. "So, depending on the need, the water generated is ready for human consumption or agricultural use."
"Though the billboard is an ad for the school, the same technology could be adapted for commercial food production," says Peters.
"The key, say the engineers, is to build it in a location that has
enough humidity in the air - Lima happens to have muggy air that the
system can use to water plants, but in other cities, the technology
might not work."
Source: Fast Company
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