World's biggest rooftop greenhouse opens in Montreal

Yahoo – AFP, Sebastien St-Jean, August 26, 2020

Lufa Farms just opened what it says is the world's largest commercial rooftop
greenhouse, seen in this aerial photo in Montreal

Building on a new hanging garden trend, a greenhouse atop a Montreal warehouse growing eggplants and tomatoes to meet demand for locally sourced foods has set a record as the largest in the world.

It's not an obvious choice of location to cultivate organic vegetables -- in the heart of Canada's second-largest city -- but Lufa Farms on Wednesday inaugurates the facility that spans 160,000 square feet (15,000 square meters), or about the size of three football fields.

"The company's mission is to grow food where people live and in a sustainable way," spokesman Thibault Sorret told AFP, as he showed off its first harvest of giant eggplants.

It is the fourth rooftop greenhouse the company has erected in the city. The first, built in 2011 at a cost of more than Can$2 million (US$1.5 million), broke new ground.

Since then, competitors picked up and ran with the novel idea, including American Gotham Greens, which constructed eight greenhouses on roofs in New York, Chicago and Denver, and French Urban Nature, which is planning one in Paris in 2022.

A local Montreal supermarket has also offered since 2017 an assortment of vegetables grown on its roof, which was "greened" in order to cut greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change.

Tomatoes are viewed at Lufa Farms, a company that just opened what it says

is the world's largest commercial rooftop greenhouse in Montreal

'Reinventing the food system'

Lebanese-born Mohamed Hage and his wife Lauren Rathmell, an American from neighboring Vermont, founded Lufa Farms in 2009 with the ambition of "reinventing the food system."

At Lufa, about 100 varieties of vegetables and herbs are grown year-round in hydroponic containers lined with coconut coir and fed liquid nutrients, including lettuce, cucumbers, zucchini, bok choy, celery and sprouts.

Bumblebees pollinate the plants, while wasps and ladybugs keep aphids in check, without the need for pesticides.

Enough vegetables are harvested each week to feed 20,000 families, with baskets tailored for each at a base price of Can$30.

The company's "online market" also sells goods produced by local partner farms including "bread, pasta, rice, etcetera," Sorret said.

On the ground floor of the new greenhouse, a huge distribution center brings together nearly 2,000 grocery products for offer to "Lufavores," including restaurants.

Shopper Catherine Bonin tells AFP she loves the freshness of the produce but laments that some items are always out of stock. "I can never get peppers," she says.

Lufa Farms spokesman Thibault Sorret shows off vegetables grown at what it 

says is the world's largest commercial rooftop greenhouse in Montreal

Sales doubled during pandemic

"We are now able to feed almost two percent of Montreal with our greenhouses and our partner farms," said Sorret.

"The advantage of being on a roof is that you recover a lot of energy from the bottom of the building," allowing considerable savings in heating, an asset during the harsh Quebec winter, he explains.

"We also put to use spaces that were until now completely unused," he said.

Fully automated, the new greenhouse also has a water system that collects and reuses rainwater, resulting in savings of "up to 90 percent" compared to a traditional farm.

Lufa "more than doubled" its sales during the new coronavirus pandemic, a jump attributable "to contactless delivery from our online site," says Sorret.

Profitable since 2016, the private company now employs 500 people, around 200 more than before the pandemic, according to him.

It is currently working on the electrification of its fleet of delivery trucks and is in the process of exporting its model "to different cities around the world," starting with Canada and the United States, Sorret said.

"What's a little crazy," he recalls, is that none of the founders "had grown a tomato in their life" before opening the business.

High-tech farmers sow seeds of revolution in Dubai desert

Yahoo – AFP, Shatha Yaish, August 18, 2020

Al-Badia market garden farm produces an array of vegetable crops in multi-storey format,
carefully controlling light and irrigation as well as recycling 90 percent of the water it uses

An ultra-modern vertical farm in the middle of the desert stands as a testament to Dubai's determination to spark a "green revolution" to overcome its dependence on food imports.

Al-Badia market garden farm produces an array of vegetable crops in multi-storey format, carefully controlling light and irrigation as well as recycling 90 percent of the water it uses.

"It's a green revolution in the middle of the desert," the farm's director Basel Jammal tells AFP.

"Each plant is given the amount of light, humidity, heat and water it needs. It's as if it were a guest in a five-star hotel," he says.

The COVID-19 pandemic, which disrupted global supply chains, has refocused attention on food security in the United Arab Emirates.

The UAE is rich in oil and ingenuity, but has little arable land and endures dry, baking summers.

That was not an issue decades ago when the area was sparsely inhabited by Bedouins.

The UAE's need to address its over-reliance on imports has inspired other 

strategies, including stockpiling and high-tech agriculture

But the wealth generated by oil discoveries since the 1970s sent expatriates flocking to the UAE.

Dubai now has more than 3.3 million inhabitants of 200 nationalities, relies largely on expensive desalinated water, and its food needs have grown and diversified.

'Choices for the future'

Dubai, like the other six emirates that make up the UAE, is heavily dependent on imports, which make up 90 percent of its food needs according to official statistics.

Produce arrives from all over the world by air and at Dubai's state-of-the-art port, stocking supermarkets with a range that compares favourably to those of any Western capital.

But in a region where geopolitical tensions with nearby Iran frequently threaten to boil over, long-term food security and self-sufficiency are key goals.

More than a decade ago, the UAE began buying or leasing agricultural land abroad, mainly in east Africa, to lock in supply even in times of crisis.

Abdellatif al-Banna is an independent farmer joining the innovation drive, 

growing pineapples in greenhouses using hydroponics and selling his production 

via an internet platform

Problems on the ground including political instability led it to look towards Australia and Eastern Europe.

But the need to address its over-reliance on imports has inspired other strategies including stockpiling and high-tech agriculture.

Jammal says his model farm where everything is controlled by computers, is a "choice for the future".

"We no longer want to depend on imports. We want to produce locally, all year round, without worrying about climate change, rainfall or drought," he says.

Like Al-Badia, a number of farms are springing up in Dubai and less-developed areas like Al-Ain and the mountainous emirate of Ras al-Khaimah.

Abdellatif al-Banna is another independent farmer joining the innovation drive, growing pineapples in greenhouses using hydroponics -- without soil -- and selling his production via an internet platform.

Not far from Dubai's coastline and glitzy skyscrapers, several farms raise cows 

in air-conditioned sheds that help provide the local market with dairy products

At his farm in Al-Awir, Banna also experiments with growing fruits, vegetables and even wheat in the cooler months -- producing enough grain for his family in what he hopes is a prototype.

Elsewhere, not far from Dubai's coastline and glitzy skyscrapers, several farms raise cows in air-conditioned sheds that help provide the local market with dairy products.

And in vast tanks overseen by a control room that duplicates Norway's sunrises and sunsets, salmon are being farmed in tanks, despite searing heat outside.

Free of shortages

Such farms are often private ventures but are actively encouraged by Emirati authorities, said Omar Bouchehab, who chairs Dubai's Food Security Committee.

Authorities have launched a plan to raise domestic agricultural production by 15 percent by 2021 and boost the use of agricultural technologies, he said.

A fruit and vegetable warehouse is seen in Dubai

At the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, while many developed cities saw shelves stripped of pasta, tinned goods and toilet rolls, Dubai did not experience any shortages in fresh produce or staples.

Thanks to airborne cargo services via giant carrier Emirates, which repurposed passenger seats to boost capacity, Dubai was even able to ensure the re-export of various food products to its neighbours.

At the Fresh Market, a large wholesale enterprise, workers busily transported and stored tonnes of imported fresh food. Executive director Redha al-Mansouri was upbeat about the emirate's food security.

"Dubai has an adequate infrastructure and a stock capable of meeting the needs of the United Arab Emirates, and even the needs of neighbouring countries," he said.

Back clean energy post-virus, UN chief urges leaders

Yahoo - AFP, July 9, 2020

Guterres urged governments to make climate-friendlier action a condition for
bailing out airlines and others (AFP Photo/KARIM SAHIB)

Paris (AFP) - United Nations chief Antonio Guterres on Thursday urged world leaders to favour clean energy solutions as they pour money into their economies to save them from a coronavirus-induced meltdown.

Governments should exit coal, stop subsidising other fossil fuels, and pressure polluting industries to clean up their act in exchange for bailing them out, the UN Secretary-General told an International Energy Agency conference by video link.

"Today I would like to urge all leaders to choose the clean energy route for three vital reasons -- health, science and economics," Guterres said.

"Bailout support to sectors such as industry, aviation and shipping should be conditioned on alignment with the goals of the Paris Agreement," he said, referring to the 2015 treaty that commits signatories to capping global warming at 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels.

"We need to stop wasting money on fossil fuel subsidies and place a price on carbon," Guterres said, adding that "coal has no place in COVID-19 recovery plans".

He also called on investors "to demand that companies reveal transition plans to reach net zero emissions" and said that renewables offered "three times more jobs than the fossil fuel industry".

Governments across the world have pledged unprecedented sums to support their economies to cope with the fallout from COVID-19, with many politicians and NGOs calling for green policies to become an integral part of the spending plans.

The European Parliament, for example, has urged EU governments to put "the green deal at the core" of their proposed 750-billion-euro recovery plan.

In Germany, where the government has agreed to rescue flagship airline Lufthansa, the environment minister said that climate-friendlier policies by the airline would be part of the deal.

In neighbouring Austria, the government made "necessary measures in terms of climate protection" a condition for bailing out Austrian Airlines.

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“Afraid of Love” + “What’s Wrong Today”, Laguna Hills, California, US(2), Dec 9, 2018 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll)

• Stagnation of the current US Politics: Compassioned (US) leaders will arise in the future
• Shortage of fresh/drinking water: Invention to make salt from salt water magnetic and remove it with water desalination process in high volumes
• Pollution on Earth: 1 - Stop killing the environment! / 2 - The rise of temperature on Earth is “temporary” and is part of the "regular" Watercycle.
• Replacement of current fossil energy source: Use of magnetics based (small/big) engines to produces electricity / free energy
• Plastic pollution in the oceans: Invention to remove the plastics gradually from the oceans

20TH KRYON SUMMER LIGHT CONFERENCE, US (7), June 2-4, 2017 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) (Text version "The State of the Earth")

"....  A mini ice age is coming. "Kryon, isn't that doom for the planet?"  Many have seen the artist's rendering of major earth cities under ice and all of the other things that go very well with science fiction movies. That's simply a painting of someone's doom scenario, not reality based in the history of the cycle. If you want to know what a mini ice age is like, just flash back in history and study what took place in about 1650. That was a mini ice age. Due to the change in the Gulf Stream (the ocean), the river Thames froze in London. Dear ones, it was cold, but it did not doom the planet. That's a mini ice age.

That's what you're facing, and I'll say it again. If you live in a cold climate, heed this advice: It's going to get colder. Get off the grid! Within the next 15 years, find a way of producing electricity independently or in smaller groups. This can be done neighborhood-wide or separately in homes. You're going to need this, dear ones, because the grid as it exists right now all over the world is not prepared for this coming cold, and the grid will fail. That's not doom and gloom, that's just practical, commonly known information. Your electricity infrastructure is delicate, too delicate. Prepare for a cold spell that may last for a couple of decades. That's all it is. Technology is racing forward to allow this. Don't let your politics get in the way of your survival. ..."

"...  This is controversial. The planet can't just "change the water". It does it instead with a "reboot of life in the ocean" using the water cycle. Watch for evidence of this as it occurs, and then remember this channel. This weather cycle is to refresh the life in the ocean so that everyone on the planet will have needed food from the ocean. Gaia does this by itself, has done it before, and it does it for a reason - so it will not stagnate.

Dear ones, indeed, you have put compromising things into the air and the water, but it has not caused this cycle. We have said for a very long time, stop killing the environment! The reason? It's going to kill you, not Gaia. Gaia is spectacularly resilient and will survive anything you do. However, it is you who may not survive if you continue polluting. All this is starting to change with your awareness, and you're starting to see this and move with it. But Humans are not causing the current weather shift. This will be known eventually.

What is happening has happened before, and it's almost like a reboot for the oceans and it carries a lot of dichotomous events. You're going to see reports of a dying ocean, but at the same time you're going to see unusual reports of too many fish and other sea life in places that were supposed to have a decline. You're going to see the life cycle of the ocean itself start to change and reboot.

The chief player in this renewal is a place you would not expect: Antarctica. I want you to watch for magic in Antarctica. It has always been the core of the refreshing of microbes and other kinds of life in your oceans and it's especially active during these mini ice ages. The process will cause currents under the sea to be filled with new life, delivering it to both hemispheres almost like an under-sea conveyor belt. ..."

"Recalibration of Free Choice"– Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth, 4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical) 8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“… 4 - Energy (again)

The natural resources of the planet are finite and will not support the continuation of what you've been doing. We've been saying this for a decade. Watch for increased science and increased funding for alternate ways of creating electricity (finally). Watch for the very companies who have the most to lose being the ones who fund it. It is the beginning of a full realization that a change of thinking is at hand. You can take things from Gaia that are energy, instead of physical resources. We speak yet; again about geothermal, about tidal, about wind. Again, we plead with you not to over-engineer this. For one of the things that Human Beings do in a technological age is to over-engineer simple things. Look at nuclear - the most over-engineered and expensive steam engine in existence!

Your current ideas of capturing energy from tidal and wave motion don't have to be technical marvels. Think paddle wheel on a pier with waves, which will create energy in both directions [waves coming and going] tied to a generator that can power dozens of neighborhoods, not full cities. Think simple and decentralize the idea of utilities. The same goes for wind and geothermal. Think of utilities for groups of homes in a cluster. You won't have a grid failure if there is no grid. This is the way of the future, and you'll be more inclined to have it sooner than later if you do this, and it won't cost as much…

Water

We've told you that one of the greatest natural resources of the planet, which is going to shift and change and be mysterious to you, is fresh water. It's going to be the next gold, dear ones. So, we have also given you some hints and examples and again we plead: Even before the potentials of running out of it, learn how to desalinate water in real time without heat. It's there, it's doable, and some already have it in the lab. This will create inexpensive fresh water for the planet. 

There is a change of attitude that is starting to occur. Slowly you're starting to see it and the only thing getting in the way of it are those companies with the big money who currently have the old system. That's starting to change as well. For the big money always wants to invest in what it knows is coming next, but it wants to create what is coming next within the framework of what it has "on the shelf." What is on the shelf is oil, coal, dams, and non-renewable resource usage. It hasn't changed much in the last 100 years, has it? Now you will see a change of free choice. You're going to see decisions made in the boardrooms that would have curled the toes of those two generations ago. Now "the worst thing they could do" might become "the best thing they could do." That, dear ones, is a change of free choice concept. When the thinkers of tomorrow see options that were never options before, that is a shift. That was number four.”

THE RELATIONSHIP TO GAIA - April 2010 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll)

New Mini Ice Age

"The weather you have today, and all the alarming attributes of it, is a scenario of what was scheduled to happen on Earth anyway. I review again that the weather changes you are seeing prophesied by myself, 21 years ago, are not a surprise. The changes are not caused by the pollutants you put in the air. You call it global warming and that's a nice phrase, and perhaps that will get you to put less pollutants in the air – a very good thing. But what you are seeing in the weather shift today was not caused by Humans putting things into the air. It would have happened anyway in about 300 years."

"We've called this process the water cycle, since it's all about water, not about air. The water is the predominant attribute of Gaia and of the weather cycle you're seeing. More predominant is the temperature of it. The cycle is ice to water and water to ice, and has been repeated on this planet over and over and over. It is not new. It is not exceptional. It is not frightening. But it's a cycle that modern humanity has not seen before, and it's a long cycle that is beyond the life span of a Human Being. Therefore, it tends to be overlooked or not seen at all !"

"In the days of the Lemurians, the water level of the Pacific Ocean was almost 400 feet lower, and that's only 50,000 years ago. [Kryon invites science to check this out – the water level at that time.] That was a water cycle working, and the reason it was lower was due to so much of the water being stored as ice. Today you're going through another water cycle that will eventually lead to cooling. The last one was in the 1400s."

"Science sees that at about 1650. As mentioned, they are so slow there is no remembrance that a Human has of them except in past writings and in the rings of the trees. The time span of the changes is so great that environmental record keeping does not exist in the form that it does today. But you can still look at the rings of the trees and at the striations of the rocks and can generally figure out that a few hundred years ago, you had a mini-ice age. Now you're going to have another one." 

A decade after Deepwater, BP faces new existential challenges

Yahoo - AFP, Véronique DUPONT, April 22, 2020

BP says it has reformed its culture over the past decade to emphasise operational
security and to prevent environmental damage (AFP Photo)

London (AFP) - Ten years after an oil spill that BP's new boss Bernard Looney admits tested the company "to the core", the firm is facing two existential challenges: the collapse of prices and climate change.

It was a decade ago this week that an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico triggered the worst oil spill in US history, killing 11 employees and ultimately costing the British firm more than $70 billion.

Speaking in February as BP announced plans to go carbon neutral by 2050, chief executive officer Looney said that "we learned some hard lessons we will never forget".

"We remember those lessons in this new decade, where the big challenge for BP is the one the world faces: climate change," he said.

Anglo-Dutch oil giant Royal Dutch Shell has followed suit in pledging to become carbon neutral but the US groups and French firm Total are lagging behind.

Map and factfile on the environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico triggered by

 the explosion in April 2010 of BP's Deepwater Horizon oil drilling platform US 

environment energy oil disaster (AFP Photo)

BP says it has reformed its culture over the past decade to emphasise operational security and to prevent environmental damage, for example through a programme to detect methane leaks.

The company's latest figures show an increase in its oil spills from 124 in 2018 to 152 in 2019, but BP puts this down to acquisitions over the period.

The 2020s began amid greater pressure on multinationals to reduce their carbon emissions, from investor demands to dramatic protests by climate campaigners.

The global coronavirus pandemic has brought a new and unprecedented challenge for oil firms, causing a drop in demand that has sent prices plummeting.

The collapse in prices complicates the transition to cleaner energy for oil majors, because cheap oil makes green energy comparatively less attractive.

For campaign group Greenpeace, the choice for the industry is clear: 'Either 

becoming renewable energy companies or ultimately shutting down' (AFP 

Photo/Mark RALSTON)

BP puts almost all of its $15 billion annual investment budget into fossil fuels, although it has acquired stakes in solar panel firms and electric vehicle charging companies worth a total of $400 million.

"Their basic business model hasn't changed," said Bobby Banerjee, professor of management at City, University of London.

"They invest most of their money in gas and oil" because "they're confident there will be demand for oil" in the next 50 to 70 years, he said.

He said for BP, the energy transition was all about shifting from oil to gas, which is still a polluting hydrocarbon.

"The return they get on fossil fuels is not the return they'll get on renewables," he said.

In this file photo taken on June 08, 2010, veterinarians clean an oil-covered brown 

pelican found off the Louisiana coast and affected by the BP (AFP Photo/Saul LOEB)

Changing the model 

Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said after the Deepwater crisis BP shed some assets and bet on low oil prices in the long run, reducing its costs and making the group more resilient.

But it has huge debts, totalling some $45 billion at the end of 2019, leaving it vulnerable to a sustained drop in revenues.

Looney now faces a dilemma. He must decarbonise the group while preserving its profitability and share price, which has fallen by 40 percent since the beginning of the year, a plunge experienced by many rivals.

He has promised to say more in September about how he will reach his carbon neutral target and is expected to bet on gas, still untested carbon capture technology and renewables.

BP could also take advantage of carbon offsetting schemes, which involve investing in green projects but are heavily criticised by environmentalists.

For campaign group Greenpeace, the choice for the industry is clear: "Either becoming renewable energy companies or ultimately shutting down."

"The crash in the oil market is the closest thing BP and the rest of the global oil industry will get to a dress rehearsal for the transition to come," a spokesperson said.

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