Eden Green embarks on $40M indoor farming expansion as it looks to grow beyond Texas
Aaron Fields inspects produce growing in Eden Green's vertical farming greenhouse in Cleburne.(LM Otero / ASSOCIATED PRESS)
An Excerpt from the Dallas Morning News article:
Thriving in a struggling industry
While Eden Green is on track to expand, other controlled environment agriculture companies haven’t fared as well. AeroFarms, a New Jersey-based vertical farming company that relied entirely on LED lighting in its indoor growing facility, just emerged from bankruptcy reorganization last month. Planted Detroit, a vertical farming company that started operations in 2018, closed in August, just a few weeks after announcing plans to build a second facility.
Badrina attributes Eden Green’s success to the fact the company combines the strengths of both conventional greenhouses and vertical indoor farms. The company uses 95% less electricity than other indoor vertical farms, saving on electricity costs, he said. Other companies that use flat-tray greenhouses and rely on sunlight only grow on one level that’s about three feet high, which leaves 18 feet of wasted vertical space, Badrina said.
“Our unit economics are so good, because we’re able to use free sunlight to grow, but in a vertical manner. So we get all the density and the yield per square foot that we can,” Badrina said.
Eden Green saves 95% of water compared to open-field farms. In fields, groundwater runs off into catchment systems, but in the company’s greenhouses, water and humidity is recycled and reclaimed and put back into the system, Badrina said.
The company strategically focuses on lettuce and herbs. Badrina said the herb industry is inconsistent because herbs require a lot of processing to get them clean enough for a consumer. Eden Green is solving for that by farming in a controlled environment.