GARDEN

divers become the future’s farmers?

The idea of cultivating food crops underwater may seem far-fetched, but a pioneering team of innovative entrepreneurs are making it a reality. In 2012, the team launched an experiment to grow basil underwater off the coast of Noli, Italy, using transparent biospheres filled with air and fixed at different depths. Today, the underwater greenhouse project, known as Nemo's Garden, has expanded to over 100 different fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers, and is being explored for potential applications in eco-tourism, fish farming, and seaweed farming, among others. With a focus on sustainability and eco-friendliness, the project aims to provide a natural alternative to traditional agriculture and eliminate the use of pesticides while creating a closed ecosystem protected from parasites.

Imagine cultivating food crops underwater. The concept was born in 2012 off the coast of Noli, Italy, by mastermind Sergio Gamberini, founder of the OceanReefGroup. During a conversation with friends, the passionate diver and avid gardener was inspired to marry both. There are regions in the world not ideal for agriculture, but what about coastal areas, or countries with bodies of freshwater? So, he asked the question, “Why not try to grow basil underwater?” And thus, the experiment began.

After some initial research, Gamberini, an innovative entrepreneur, invested his own funds into the start-up. With the help of his team at Ocean Reef, six 6 m/20 ft tall transparent biospheres were sunk to the bottom of the sea, filled with approximately 2,000 litres of air, and fixed at different depths between 6-10 m/2030 ft. To access the contents of the biospheres, the diving farmers have a step grid where they can stand up with half their bodies inside the pods while they tend to the crops while the other half of their bodies are outside.

Underwater greenhouse

The goal behind the project is to be self-sustainable and provide an economically viable, eco-friendly alternative form of agriculture. With the use of renewable energy from the sun and desalinated sea water, the microclimatic and thermal conditions inside the biospheres are the optimal environments for crop growth. No soil is used; instead, it is a hydroponic culture in which the plants are grown in a controlled environment using nutrient-rich solution to deliver water and minerals to their roots.

The underwater biosphere domes are anchored to the ocean floor with sturdy chains.

With the difference in temperatures between the air inside the pod and that of the water around it, water at the bottom of the biosphere evaporates to easily condensate to the internal surface area, sustaining the growing crops. Each biosphere is equipped with sensors for CO2, O2, humidity, air temperature, and sunlight. The external water temperature is regularly checked at both the shallower and deeper biospheres through a control tower equipped with five monitors and a laptop that enables the team to communicate with each other through an intercom. It is the near-constant sea temperature between day and night that creates the ideal growing conditions for the crops. With the setup devised, there is no need for LED lighting, power, or temperature regulating tools that are used in regular greenhouse systems on land.

Basil was the project’s first crop, and by 2015 they had produced green basil and red basil, five other herbs, four different lettuces, tomatoes, courgettes, green beans, peas, flowers, aloe vera, and mushrooms to name just a few in the ongoing experimental process. Through trial and error, the biospheres were upgraded, and their number increased, thus resulting in today’s fruitful underwater habitats. This underwater oasis now grows over 100 different fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers.

Closed ecosystem

Other companies interested in the science of growing food underwater have adopted similar projects to see what plants grown underwater could unveil in the future. Plants have been grown in experiments for cosmetics and pharmaceutical products, turning the biospheres into underwater labs. Some companies are looking into other possible biosphere uses—for eco-tourism, fish farming, seaweed farming, and more.

The crops thrive due to the consistent sea temperature, which provides ideal growing conditions.

The crops are grown in a controlled hydroponic environment, without the use of soil.

The biospheres are strict ecological environments that are somewhat difficult to disrupt, and this underwater greenhouse project could make pesticides obsolete; the closed ecosystem within the biospheres is protected from parasites, eliminating the need for these compounds. While the plants are supplied with essential, naturally-occurring nutrients via hydroponic solutions, further research is being conducted on the possibilities of producing natural fertilizers from algae found in the underwater farming environments.

In 2021, Nemo’s Garden partnered with Siemens, one of the world’s leading technology companies, which is providing support, studying, modelling, and improving the technology of Nemo’s Garden and finalizing its industrialization as a sustainable food alternative for the world.

Progress on this collaboration will be shared on Nemo’s Garden’s website. If you would like to learn more about the project, further info can be found at www.nemosgarden.com.

Ally Landes

information from divers, scientists, conservationists, underwater photographers, and other like-minded individuals from around the world with a mission to conserve and protect our delicate marine ecosystems.

www.allylandes.com