When the Canadian Space Agency decided to investigate the unlikely task of growing food in outer space, it looked toward a place on Earth that faces similar growing issues: northern Labrador.
Lynn Blackwood is the Nunatsiavut Government’s Food Security Programs Manager and a jury member for the Canadian Space Agency’s Deep Space Food Challenge.
“In the North, much of the power is generated by diesel, and diesel can give off extra heat, so there’s interesting ways to gather heat that’s coming from a generation plant and be able to power a greenhouse.”
Blackwood said hydroponics play a big role in a lot of the ideas, as well as a focus on non-traditional produce, like spirulina, a nutritious form of algae.
Incorporating solutions into Nunatsiavut culture is important too, she said.
“Innovative ways to grow food married within the food system of the North, where many people follow that traditional lifestyle where they hunt and gather food.”
She said the technology being developed would make a huge difference to Nunatsiavut communities.
“People definitely would like to have more fresh produce available. As you can imagine, weather conditions can be really impactful on delivering fresh produce to the north in the winter time,” she said.
“There’s been times when I’ve been on the coast and in Nunatsiavut, and produce has been delivered and the plane may have come at a time when it wasn’t expected.
And then the people who are expecting the freight aren’t notified and the freight is offloaded. And then it’s left there and in the temperature, it’ll freeze.”
Blackwood said that’s why infrastructure and system planning is also an important aspect of the ideas to consider.
Courtesy of CBC.