By Mary Hardbarger

“Creative collisions.”

That’s the phrase Michael Evans, the director of the School for Plant and Environmental Sciences, often uses to describe the many partnerships which have made the Controlled Environment Agriculture Innovation Center a growing success.

The center is part of the SmartFarm Innovation Network, a platform of Virginia Tech’s Center for Advanced Innovation in Agriculture.

In the four years since the Controlled Environment Agriculture Innovation Center’s creation, it has exploded with activity and advancement in the areas of research, technology development, outreach, and economic impact, all related to the art of controlled environment agriculture. Also known as CEA, this fast-growing form of farming encompasses a range of technology-driven practices, such as hydroponics and vertical growing.

With the value of global indoor farming expected to reach $122.3 billion by 2030, according to a study by Grand View Research, Inc., there has been a rapid increase in this method of farming. While there is currently not an exact count of the number of indoor vertical farm operations in Virginia, Evans said southern Virginia, where several global CEA companies located this past year, is a hotspot.

Megan
Megan Pollok, a sophomore in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, is researching the resistance of winter wheat to the disease to help save producers from its deadly effects.

Several of these “creative collisions” have helped position the innovation center as a lead driver for controlled environment agriculture. One such occurrence last year at the Indoor Ag-Con in Las Vegas, Nevada, the country’s largest CEA trade show and conference.

The west-coast-based conference was looking for an east-coast collaborator, and in late October, the Controlled Environment Agriculture Innovation Center co-hosted the first-ever CEA Summit East. The event attracted more than 200 participants from 28 states, Canada, and Puerto Rico to the Danville complex to network and discuss the future of CEA.

“A perfect example of a creative collision,” Evans said.

Common themes of the inaugural summit and overarching goals of the innovation center are workforce development and economic impact.

As Virginia continues to attract global CEA companies, such as Plenty Unlimited, Inc., and AeroFarms, the demand will increase for trained employees to fill these positions, Evans said.

Rows of plants on trays

Common themes of the inaugural summit and overarching goals of the innovation center are workforce development and economic impact.

As Virginia continues to attract global CEA companies, such as Plenty Unlimited, Inc., and AeroFarms, the demand will increase for trained employees to fill these positions, Evans said.

Plenty and AeroFarms arrived in Virginia in 2022. New Jersey-based AeroFarms established the world’s largest aeroponics farm in Pittsylvania County. The facility is capable of growing more than 3 million pounds of leafy greens a year. Similarly, California-based Plenty, a Bay Area indoor agriculture company, plans to build a $300 million vertical farming campus in Chesterfield County.

Both companies are partners of the innovation center, where faculty are continually conducting research to keep up with the latest CEA technology. Student and faculty researchers in different fields work on projects related to genetics and breeding, the reduction and recycling of waste, and microbiology and beneficial bacteria. Many of these projects are a result of the 2022 USDA Specialty Crop Block Grant Program announced by Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin last year, a testament to the center’s impact on the commonwealth’s growing interest in CEA.

Beyond research and technology, the center has amped up its Virginia Cooperative Extension efforts, Evans said. Bringing resources such as workforce training and experiential learning to local communities will help foster the growth of CEA.

Virginia Secretary of Agriculture and Forestry Matthew Lohr spoke of these advances as a keynote speaker at the summit. He called for further collaboration to support the commonwealth’s desire to be “the CEA capital of the world.”

“Virginia will be the center for high-tech agriculture,” Lohr said. “We have made progress, and I am even more excited about what the future of farming looks like.”