Everyone should have availability to affordable nutrient-rich fresh produce, wherever in the world. This is the vision of brothers Jacques and Eugene van Buuren, two South African innovators who spent eight years on developing a new vertical-farming technology. The brothers recently partnered with a group of Dallas-based entrepreneurs to venture the first large scale greenhouse project that utilizes their system and commercializes the produce through Walmart.

Vertical growing system
Eden Green is located south of Forth Worth, Texas, just outside of Cleburne. Inside their impressive greenhouses, an unique vertical, soilless growing system produces a wide range of leafy greens like romaine, kale and bok choy with a special hydroponic technology that feeds water, nutrients and CO2 directly into the root environment.

Vision
What makes the project special is the vision behind Eden Green; the founders want to take vertical farming out of the niche market and make a premium, healthy product available to a larger community. “Lots of people have tried to do small, urban things, you know, stuff in shipping containers,” co-chairman Gentry Beach told the Star Telegram. “We wanted this to be a product for the masses. People’d say, ‘Why’d you start with Wal-Mart? They’re the everyday low-price guys. You’ve got a premium product.’ I said, ‘We want to give this to everyone.’ ”

Dedicated solutions
Ridder is proud to be part of the first large scale commercial project of Eden Green. Our specialists designed and installed several dedicated climate and irrigation solutions that support the efficient and sustainable cultivation inside the Eden Green system.

Tailor-made
Besides many other distinguished technology, the project makes use of several Ridder Vitalite disinfection units for a safe and fully closed irrigation cycle in which all of the water and nutrients can be recirculated. Ridder also delivered customized FertiMiX irrigation units to precisely compose a balanced mix of nutrients and irrigation water. Next to this, Ridder provided Eden Green with a HortiMaX MultiMa climate control computer that gives full control over the growing environment and allow the growers of Eden Green to create a ‘tailor’-made’ greenhouse climate according to the specific needs of their crops and growing cycle.