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V O L . X X I N O. X V J U LY 1 3 , 2 0 1 5 20 T he eclectic local foodie scene will soon get a new source of fresh vegetables from Maine greenhouses that use aquaponics, an indoor ecosystem where plants grow in large tubs of water and use waste from live fi sh as fertilizer. Springworks Farm in Lisbon expects to start selling organic aquaponic lettuce this month and Fluid Farms LLC in Dresden plans to sell lettuce in about two months. Both aim to add other vegeta- bles as they expand production. Island Aquaponics Food & Grocery, a startup agriculture venture on Long Island in Casco Bay, is raising greens and tila- pia in a trial greenhouse and expects to expand into an 800-square-foot greenhouse. "Aquaponics is an emerging industry," says Trevor Kenkel, 20, a Bowdoin College rising sopho- more who started Springworks in the spring of 2014 and is the company's president. At Bowdoin, he is studying biology and economics. "We can control more aspects of the environ- ment than a soil farmer, and we can get 12 crop rota- tions per year," Kenkel says, noting that aquaponic farms can produce vegetables year-round. "We can distinguish ourselves by the quality of our product and the ability to deliver on a consistent basis." "You get a much higher yield per acre than a traditional farm, which needs about six acres for every one acre of aquaponic production," says Jackson McLeod, co-owner and operator at Fluid Farms. McLeod and partner Tyler Gaudet had a 3,000-square-foot hoop house in North Yarmouth, but over the past year they have been moving to Dresden, where they relocated the hoop house and will add a 38,000-square-foot greenhouse — one of the state's largest — in stages. "Aquaponics doesn't cost more," McLeod adds. " ere's an opportunity for a lower price point for organic products because it requires less labor." Companies are growing up around the aqua- ponics business, designing system equipment for it. Aquaculture Engineering Inc., based in Washington, plans to market a franchisable aquaponics system. Autonomic Labs Inc., an early-stage company, is building a wireless sensor system called the "autoabo- tanist" for monitoring farm conditions and issuing alerts to mobile devices if readings are abnormal. At schools, the University of New England in Biddeford is ready to scale up its experimental aqua- ponics facility to eventually provide year-round fresh greens to the cafeteria. e University of Maine's Center for Cooperative Aquaculture Research in Franklin is studying aquaponics for demonstration and business development. And middle-school youth at RSU 13's Alternative Education Program in 2010 established an aquaponics business called School of Roots that they run out of the Herring Gut Learning Center in Port Clyde. More with less Year-round fresh greens are just part of the story. About 98% of lettuce is grown in California and Arizona. While displacing some of those shipments will save on fuel and emissions for lettuce travel- ing to the East Coast, aquaponic systems also could help Californians grow more effi ciently in drought conditions, Kenkel says. Aquaponics uses about 90% less land and water than soil agriculture but potentially could generate three to four times more food, according to a report from Industry ARC, a Hamilton, N.Y., consult- ing and research company. It estimated that global sales for aquaponics could hit $1 billion by 2020, up from $180 million in 2013. e return on investment for aquaponic systems ranges from one to two years, depending on the farm's scale and the farmer's expe- rience, the consultancy found. Today's aquaponic farmers are applying modern technology to a technique fi rst started by the Aztecs, who fl oated rafts of plants on water bodies so fi sh could fertilize them. Aquaponics saw a resurgence in the 1970s and 1980s when the New Alchemy Institute in Hatchville, Mass., and others advanced the technique. Aquaponics diff ers from the better-known hydro- ponic farming, like the tomatoes from Madison-based Backyard Farms. Hydroponics requires adding chemi- cal fertilizers to water to grow the plants, while aqua- ponics uses fertilizer from live fi sh, which typically are kept in separate containers. Water from the fi sh tanks is piped through the plant tanks to fertilize the plants, which in turn clean the water for return to the fi sh. Fish excrete ammonia, which is turned into nitrite by bacteria in the aquaponic system. Diff erent bacteria turn the nitrite into nitrate, also a common ingredient in soil fertilizers. Filters remove the fi sh excrement solids. e plants absorb the nitrate to grow. "Aquaponics uses fi sh waste to cultivate an ecosystem similar to a creek," says Kenkel, who at age 10 became interested in aquaponics and aquaculture, or fi sh farm- ing. One day while fl y fi shing in a local glacier-fed P H O T O / T I M G R E E N WAY A promise of higher ag yields Aquaponics offers new source of food B y L o r i V a l i g r a Trevor Kenkel, president of Lisbon's Springworks Farm, has more than $1 million invested in a greenhouse and surrounding property. In the greenhouse, plants on fl oats draw nourishment from fi sh waste.

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