The Potential for Commercial Implementation and Operation of Aquaponic Urban Farms

This project will build the UK's first aquaponic urban farm to quantify the economic and environmental potential of sustainable urban farming. Led by GrowUp - a start-up specialising in aquaponic farming - it will use aquaponics in an innovative configuration to exploit a symbiosis between wastestreams of aquaculture and nutrients required for hydroponic plant growth. The consortium's expertise in aquaponics, commercial hydroponics & recirculating aquaculture will allow them to manage and investigate this relationship at scale in an urban location in London. The project will build a prototype to demonstrate scaled urban production, focused on optimised control of growing systems, creating an opportunity for the franchise of a UK global commercial offering in local, urban sustainable intensified agriculture. Consortium partners are GrowUp Urban Farms; I+S Associates; Sterner AquaTech and Arup, including support from the GLA, the London Borough of Newham, Siemens and Plymouth University.