Sustainable Planning Design

Sustainable Planning Design and Management Esther Kiruba 19171NB002

Contents What is Hydroponics?

History of Hydroponics Techniques Benefits of Hydroponics Potential Disadvantages Case Study

Hydroponics Plants grow through use sunlight and a called chlorophyll gas in the air) and sugar) and oxygen.

photosynthesis, in which they chemical inside their leaves to convert carbon dioxide (a water into glucose (a type of

6CO2 + 6H2O

→ C6H12O6 + 6O2

There's no mention of "soil". What they do need is water and nutrients, both easily obtained from soil. But if they can get these things somewhere else—say, by standing with their roots in a nutrient-rich solution—they can do without soil altogether. That's the basic principle behind hydroponics.

https://www.explainthatstuff.com/hydroponics.html

History

The word hydroponics comes from two Greek words, "hydro" meaning water and "ponics" meaning labor.

The concept of soil less gardening or hydroponics has been around for thousands of years.

The hanging Gardens of Babylon and The Floating Gardens of China are two of the earliest examples of hydroponics. Growing crops by hydroponic farming, or on water, has been practiced since the ancient Babylonians planted their legendary Hanging Gardens of Babylon. These were the world’s first vertical farms concept.Hydroponic water gardens also include roof top gardens in Middle East cities like Beirut and Cairo.

Scientists started experimenting gardening around 1950.

with

soil

https://www.hydroponics.net/learn/hydroponic_garde ning_for_beginners.php

less

Hanging Gardens

Aztecs & China

Modern Day

These gardens were built along the Euphrates River in Babylonia. Since the region's climate was dry and rarely saw the rain, people believe that the ancient

Other records of Hydroponics in the ancient times were found with the floating farms around the island city of Tenochtitlan by the Aztecs in Mexico in the 10th and 11th century.

It was not until 1600 that there were recorded scientific experiments done on plants growth & constituents.

Babylonians used a chain pull system for watering the garden plants. In this method, water was pulled from the river and flowed up along the chain system and dropped to the steps or landing of the garden.

And in the late 13th century, the explorer, Marco Polo noted in his writing that he saw similar floating gardens during his traveling to China.

Belgian Jan Van Helmont with his experiment indicated that plants obtained substances from water.

However, he failed to know that plants also need carbon dioxide and oxygen from the air.John Woodward followed to study the growth of plants using water culture in 1699. He found that plants grew best in water that contained the most soil. So he came to the conclusion that it was certain substances in the water derived from the soil that led to the plant growth, rather than from the water itself.

Techniques & Methods in Hydroponics

Parts of Hydroponics Hydroponics operates on the premise that as long as you are able to provide with what they need, plants will grow well.

In this sense, Hydroponics is invented to rule out the influence of mother nature - It can be placed in a controlled growing environment.

Hydroponics replaces the soil with water and the growing media. The growing media can be Perlite, sand, Rockwool, etc. Their main role is to transfer the nutrients in the water and keep the roots oxygenated.

Hydroponics is usually grown indoors or in a greenhouse. This means growers will take full management of the environment - climate, temperature, lights, ventilation, and so on.

Types of Hydroponics Wick System

Deep Water Culture

Nutrient Film Technique (NFT)

This system is considered the most simple type of Hydroponic system.As the name means, this type works by pumping the nutrient solution from the reservoir up to the plants via the capillary movement like a wick into the growing media of the grow tray.

DWC is an active recovery Hydroponic system. It works by hanging a net pot with plants held by a floating Styrofoam platform so that the roots are submerged with the nutrient solutions.

NFT works by continuously flowing nutrient solutions onto the grow tray, so it doesn't need a timer.

The solutions then run through the roots system of the plants till its reaches the channels' end then drains back to the reservoir. It is able to do that because the tube is slightly downward.

Types of Hydroponics Drip Systems

Aeroponics

In Drip systems, growers use a timer to set the pump to draw the nutrient solutions through a network of drip lines. These drip lines will drop tiny amounts of water onto the plants.

Probably, the most high-tech type among the six. In this type of system, plants hung in the air, so no growing media are used. A timer controls the nutrient water pump to spray onto the root systems constantly. The spray cycle is quite quick because the roots are exposed to the air and need sufficient moistures.

Ebb and Flow (Flood and Drain)

Ebb and Flow method works by using a timer to set the pump to pull the nutrients from the reservoir to the grow tray periodically. After the nutrient surrounds plants'roots, it drains back to the system.

Nutrients

For hydroponics, these three nutrient mixes to regularly fertilize system: N-P-K mix Calcium nitrate Epsom salt (magnesium sulfate) Crops will be claiming oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon from the water and air around them. For the most part, we don’t need to worry about those three.

The rest of the primary nutrients are nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium.

Those will be provided in the NPK fertilizer.

Benefits

Hydroponics is proved to have several advantages over soil gardening. The growth rate on a hydroponic plant is 30-50 percent faster than a soil plant, grown under the same conditions.

The yield of the plant is also greater. Scientists believe that there are several reasons for the drastic differences between hydroponic and soil plants. The extra oxygen in the hydroponic growing mediums helps to stimulate root growth. Plants with ample oxygen in the root system also absorb nutrients faster.

The nutrients in a hydroponic system are mixed with the water and sent directly to the root system. The plant does not have to search in the soil for the nutrients that it requires. Those nutrients are being delivered to the plant several times per day.

30-50% FASTER Greater Yield More Nutrients

Benefits

The hydroponic plant requires very little energy to find and break down food. The plant then uses this saved energy to grow faster and to produce more fruit.

Hydroponic plants also have fewer problems with bug infestations, funguses and disease. In general, plants grown hydroponically are healthier and happier plants.

Hydroponic gardening also offers several benefits to our environment. Hydroponic gardening uses considerably less water than soil gardening, because of the constant reuse the nutrient solutions.

Due to lack of necessity, fewer pesticides are used on hydroponic crops. Since hydroponic gardening systems use no topsoil, topsoil erosion isn't even an issue. Although, if agricultural trends continue to erode topsoil and waste water, hydroponics may soon be our only solution.

Less Disease Save 95% Water

Healthier

https://www.hydroponics.net/learn/hydroponic_gardening_for_beginners.php

Potential Disadvantages

Initial expenses Upon starting, you are sure to make some investments to get necessary equipment for the system, including a hydroponic air pump, timer, lights, air filters, fans, containers, growing media, nutrients, and etc.

Technical knowledge and experiences.

Depending on the scale and types of your systems, you'll need to own specific knowledge to set up, maintain and monitor. You'll also need to know how plants work in Hydroponics. Don't worry about these issues, because you're reading this now.

System failure and power outage.

The plants are depending on you for their survival. In case a power outage happens, they face a great risk of death in a few hours when the plant roots are stopped watering and get dried.

Organic product debates.

It is still questionable whether Hydroponic plants will get microbiomes as they are in the soil.

Case Study Urban Kisaan

UrbanKisaan was started in 2017 in Hyderabad.

The aim was to grow more than just fresh and nutritious food.

They wanted to create a sustainable future for farming and feed the world in a way that is good for both people and planet.

By creating hyper-local urban farms they create a complete transparent supply chain with low-carbon footprint and our growing technique helps us save 95% water yet grow 30x compared to traditional farms

https://www.urbankisaan.com/homekits

Process of Urban Kisaan

https://www.urbankisaan.com/homekits

The Urban Farming with Hydroponics is urban homes.

Local. Modern farms close to

Pure and Fresh produce possible, filled with nutrients harvested just minutes away before delivery.

Sustainable method of farming.

Saving 95% water, yet produce 30 times farming with very minimal carbon-footprint

more

than

traditional

Highlights

My Experiments with Lockdown Urban Hydroponic Gardening

Spring Onion While you can start the spring onions in a hydroponic setup, some growers also prefer to first start them in the soil.

After that, you can simply have a small furrow in the soil and insert bulbs or place seeds, and then when they sprout, you can move them to the desired hydroponic system.

A Easy way is to get a few spring onion sprigs and use them cutting off the shoots and leave the roots, then use the roots to propagate in water (which is how I started growing my spring onions which were ready for harvest in just 5 days).