Food to Grid: Developing a Multi-Value renewable energy investment ecosystem

Abstract

The paper is focused on building a multi-source small-scale facility that shall be focused on increasing the Renewable Energy Sources share into the grid and at the same time meet the energy, and fresh food needs of the small community that shall operate. The developed facility that shall be utilised is introducing, in practice, a sustainable Energy-Food nexus plan that can be implemented and put into action by the independent power producers and municipalities, meeting also the goal of supporting the grid (a Food to Grid approach). A case study was tested, and it was found that a scheme that couples the curtailed power with a potential mass deployment of vertical farms is beyond sustainable and even with very low marginal price-earnings and the minimum price offered for vertical farms, under specific scenarios can have a full payback in 14 years as an investment. However, in the average optimal case, the investors can get their investments back in 7 years, with an internal rate of return of 17%.