Host: Tom Angus, Director of Conferences, Decarb Connect
Guest: Oskar Schortz, Co-Founder & CCO, GyroPlant
In partnership with Urban Future Lab
Every hydroponic farm in the world depends on growing substrates - the rockwool, coco coir, or peat that plants grow in and almost all of it ends up in landfill after a single use. It’s a supply chain problem hiding in plain sight, embedded in one of the world’s most critical industrial sectors.
In this episode of our mini-series in collaboration with Urban Future Lab, Tom is joined by Oskar Schortz is the Co-Founder and CCO of GyroPlant. They discuss how a small UK deep tech company is engineering its way out of that problem entirely, and what it means for the carbon footprint of controlled environment agriculture at commercial scale.
GyroPlant, a materials and systems innovation company that has developed the GyroCup — a reusable, food-grade silicone growing vessel designed to last up to 10 years and replace disposable substrates across hydroponic and vertical farming operations. They're working with over 200 companies across multiple continents, including a formal Innovate UK project with Dole plc, and has participated in trade missions to Singapore and the UAE through Innovate UK’s Global Incubator Programme.
What you’ll take away:
- Understand what controlled environment agriculture actually is, and why GyroPlant is best understood as a materials and systems company rather than a farming or food business
- Why GyroPlant pivoted from designing whole growing systems to focusing specifically on the substrate problem and what they saw on farms that made that the priority
- What substrates are, why every hydroponic farm currently depends on them, and why they represent a major sustainability liability in the food production supply chain
- How the GyroCup works in practice and what the switchover from single-use growing media actually looks like for a commercial farm
- Where the claimed 90% carbon saving versus the next best substrate option actually comes from - manufacturing, shipping, waste disposal, or all three
- How aware large food businesses are of the carbon footprint inside their growing media and whether they’re being asked to account for it
- Whether the indoor farming sector’s recent high-profile collapses create headwinds for GyroPlant or whether they actually accelerate demand as farms look to cut costs
- The single most important environmental cost that large-scale growers are probably not measuring right now
Show Links:
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find out more and talk with Jack Figg, Community Director.
What is Decarb Connect?
Examining the strategies and deployments around decarbonisation in hard to abate sectors, we speak with CEOs, heads of corporate strategy, CTOs, Innovation/R&D, project directors & heads of carbon management from around the world. Hosted by Alex Cameron of the Decarbonization Leaders Network and Decarb Connect & produced by Janno Media.