Reid between the lines
The Nevada senator talks about food and renewable energy
By Kat Kerlin
katk@newsreview.com
More stories by this author…
Sen. Harry Reid admires the hydroponic lettuce grown by Tom (left) and John (right) Blount of Nevada Naturals during a tour of the greenhouses at UNR.
PHOTO BY KAT KERLIN
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U.S. Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada nibbled a piece of chocolate mint grown from the waters of Nevada Naturals, which operates a hydroponic greenhouse at the University of Nevada, Reno last week. It was one stop on a tour of renewable energy and agriculture projects underway at the university’s new greenhouse complex off Valley Road. Earlier, he admired grapevines growing inside another greenhouse, research to produce a domestic supply of natural rubber, bubbling pools of algae and a gasifier that turns the algae and other forms of biomass into energy.
Then he sat down for an exclusive interview with Reno News & Review to discuss his thoughts on the future of energy and agriculture in Nevada.
Reid agrees with many renewable energy leaders that the lack of a transmission line—and a smart grid system—is perhaps the biggest obstacle to producing and distributing renewable energy both in Nevada and nationwide.
“We can produce lots of renewable energy all over the country, but where the renewable energy is produced, people don’t live there,” he said. “We have to take that energy to the people.”
And one of the impediments to that is a lethargic permitting process to get transmission lines and renewable energy projects built on public lands. He said he’s introduced legislation that calls for an “adequate time”—which he determines as being about a year and a half—for public agencies, such as the Bureau of Land Management, to review and plan for the projects. Beyond that point, the federal government could step in using eminent domain or condemnation.
“Renewable energy will never be a success until we take it where it’s needed,” said Reid. In addition to lack of transmission lines, he said, “the hindrances are making sure the state agencies have adequate resources and manpower to do the permit process.”
When asked how to best balance renewable energy development in the state with protecting wildlife habitat, Reid said, “I think we’re going to do a better job of protecting the environment by having renewable projects. Coal and fossil fuel are destroying the environment.” He referenced a large solar energy project north of Las Vegas saying it is “big, but there’s no smoke coming out of it. It’s not a problem at all.” Still, conservation groups are currently working to develop maps suggesting places for development that would be least likely to disturb ecologically sensitive lands.
Reid perked up when the subject came to local food production.
“These greenhouses are a perfect example of that,” he said. He was impressed by Nevada Naturals’ ability to grow thousands of pounds of produce in a greenhouse that cost $10,000 to build—a cost quickly redeemed in a season’s growth. Even more impressive, their hydroponic methods—despite being grown in water—actually use less water than most produce grown in soil. One roughly 4-feet-by-6-feet section of plants required only one gallon of water every 10 days. He added, “I was looking at these grapes in the greenhouse. Alfalfa takes 14 times more water than grapes.”
Be it energy or food, the state appears to be in a time of transition. To produce them, Reid said, “I just think people have to get modern.
Sparks Nevada Tribune
By Sarah Cooper * Jun 26, 2008
Local growers give up the dirt on hydroponics
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U.S. Senate Majority Leader Tours Nevada Greenhouse Complex
Nevada Senator Harry Reid learns of hydroponic vegetable production processes from Tom and John Blount, owners of Nevada Naturals. Photo by Daniel Clark.
Friday, April 17, 2009
By Mikalee Byerman
Nevada Senator Harry Reid toured the Nevada Greenhouse Complex Wednesday, learning about renewable energy and agriculture projects taking place in the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and Natural Resources at the University of Nevada, Reno.
On the tour, Reid saw a biomass project that focuses on converting algae to biofuels and a collaborative greenhouse project where produce is grown using hydroponic methods. He praised the new greenhouse projects that are focused on renewable energy and the development of high-valued crops.
“This is what the university should be doing,” Reid said in a press conference following the tour, “experiments that transmit to and benefit the public sector.”
Dr. John Cushman, professor and director of CABNR’s graduate program in biochemistry and molecular biology, showed Reid ponds growing halophytic green algae – algae that can grow in salt water that is two times as strong as sea water – and discussed its ability to produce oil and starch for biodiesel and ethanol production.
Reid then examined rabbit brush, a common native Nevadan plant, and discussed its ability to produce natural rubber with Dr. David Shintani, assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology.
“We were honored to have Senator Reid join us and learn more about these and other critical projects,” said Ron Pardini, acting dean of the College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and Natural Resources. “Our brand new Greenhouse Complex is an invaluable resource for our professors, our students and the community that will help us improve processes and ultimately benefit society through leading-edge research and innovation.”
The final stop on the tour was a visit to the Nevada Naturals hydroponic vegetable production greenhouse, a project currently underway in partnership with the Nevada Agricultural Experiment Station.
While there, the senator talked with Nevada Naturals owners Tom and John Blount and sampled hydroponically grown lettuce, discussing the application of hydroponic technology in Nevada and abroad.
“Nevada is blessed with enough geothermal, solar, wind and biomass resources to power a clean energy revolution,” Reid said. “Renewable energy and efficiency means thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of investment in Nevada. That potential makes it exciting to see the next generation of clean energy industry leaders studying and gaining hands on experience in the production of clean energy right here at UNR.”
Reno Gazette Newspaper
BY JOHNATHAN L. WRIGHT • jwright@rgj.com • August 20, 2008
After a visit to Nevada Naturals, you might never look at salad the same way again.
Tom Blount, who owns Nevada Naturals with his brother John, guides a visitor down greenhouse rows brimming with microgreens and lettuces grown hydroponically — that is, in a nutrient solution instead of soil. He snaps off leaves here, flower buds there, offering up everything for tasting.
Wild Japanese spinach delivers a peppery finish. Bronze fennel leaves have a sharper licorice flavor than familiar fennel bulbs. Merlot lettuce is intensely bitter and smudged purple-green. Micro basil furnishes a powerful perfume. Minuscule mustard flowers seem mild at first, but three bites in — whoosh! — the heat arrives.
And then there is the variety of mint that tastes like a blend of mint and, yes, chocolate.
“You could make a nice mojito out of it,” John Blount said, laughing.
The brothers Blount, refugees from the restaurant business, founded Nevada Naturals in 2006. In their two greenhouses, soon to be four, they grow 21 varieties of lettuce and 24 microgreen varities, as well as basil, tomatoes, peppers and strawberries. Nevada Naturals yields about 200 pounds of produce per day from some 32,000 plants.
This yield, the brother said, requires only 25 gallons of water, a fraction of what would be needed with conventional agriculture. Hydroponics, the Blounts continued, conserves land and doesn’t incorporate the use of chemical pesticides. Locally grown hydroponic produce also requires less fuel to ship.
The Blounts sell their produce at farmers markets and to a handful of area restaurants.
“The chefs love to come in to taste different lettuces and create their own blends,” John Blount said.
With the growth of the local foods movement and their increasing production capacity, the Blounts hope to widen their distribution.
Hydroponics could be the future of agriculture, they said, especially in the desert climate of Northern Nevada.
Fruitful partnership
Nevada Naturals leases greenhouse space at the Valley Road Field Laboratory of the University of Nevada’s College of Agriculture, Biotechnology and Natural Resources. The joint effort, all parties agree, is good for Nevada Naturals and good for the university.
“It offers a great opportunity to train students in hydroponic vegetable production and a great opportunity for research and evaluating the possibility of growing vegetables hydroponically year round in Reno,” said Ron Pardini, the associate director of the university’s Agricultural Experiment Station, the research arm of the agriculture college.
One proposed study would compare the nutritional content, flavor and marketability of hydroponic vegetables with vegetables grown organically and with conventional farming. The study could help settle the question of whether hydroponic vegetables are healthier and tastier than standard produce.
Greens afloat
Right now, the Blounts use an ebb-and-flow hydroponic system in which organic seeds are started in a rockwool growing medium and then transferred to plastic rain gutters with plant holes drilled into them. A pump circulates oxygen rich nutrient solution three or four times a day. Excess is collected in barrels for reuse.
When Nevada Naturals has all four greenhouses up and running, three will use a new system in which trays containing rows of plants will float atop six inches of solution. The fourth greenhouse will be devoted to aeroponics, a sister growing method in which plant roots are suspended in air and sprayed with nutrient mist. Tomatoes take especially well to aeroponic growing.
The Blounts predicted the four greenhouses will yield about 10,000 pounds of produce a month, an amount that should help quiet naysayers who contend that many family farmers can’t grow produce in sufficient amounts for commercial establishments.
Flavor all year
Hydroponics, of course, isn’t new.
Many scholars believe the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, were essentially hydroponic, “and hydroponics is how the Caesars grew their cucumbers,” Tom Blount said.
Countries like Israel, Australia and the Netherlands are leading the way in broad scale hydroponic agriculture, but stateside, hydroponics has had a harder time gaining traction.
A whiff of hippyish faddism still clings to hydroponics, perhaps because marijuana is often grown hydroponically. But the larger challenge has its roots in tradition. The conventional food and farming lobbies are strong, and “farmers tend to keep on doing what they’ve been doing for generations,” Tom Blount said.
Plus, federal farming grant and loan guidelines have only recently been changed to allow more hydroponic growers to apply for funding.
If the environmental arguments for hydroponics aren’t sufficient, growers can always appeal to the palate, Tom Blount said.
Imagine local tomatoes, juicy and truly vine ripened, available almost any month of the year. With hydroponics, it’s possible.
Link to Article below:
http://sbdcnet.org/success-stories/nevada-naturals.php
Article in it’s entiretl:
Nevada Naturals
Would you believe that space-age technology could be used to make a tastier leaf of lettuce? Tom and John Blount demonstrate that the proof is actually in the salad. Through the use of hydroponics (a technique of growing of plants without soil, perfected by NASA, and used in space shuttles), the Brothers Blount grow lettuce, tomatoes, herbs, and hundreds of other fruits and vegetables using less water,
less
energy, and less manpower than either conventional or organic agriculture processes. And amazingly, the taste and nutritional value of their produce puts your average grocery store to shame.
“Hydroponics is the future of agriculture,” says John Blount, who seems continually pleased with the beauty and simplicity of the hydroponic process.
“A hydroponically grown [plant] will have a higher nutritional value because it is living in the perfect conditions and getting the correct amount of nutrients, and there is no breakdown where pathogens are allowed into the plant,” says Tom. And grow tubes can be adjusted to accommodate the specific plant it houses. “Each plant likes a different kind of mineral intake,” says Tom.
Additionally, hydroponic plants grow faster, and produce more crops throughout their life than the average plant. “[Hydroponics] uses a lot less water, a lot less electricity, a lot less power, you don’t have to use pesticides or insecticides, you don’t have to bend down to pick things… it has every advantage economically that you can think of ” there’s nothing negative about it.” The ability to produce locally allows Nevadans to sidestep high transportation costs and pollution that we normally incur by importing vegetables from southern California in the summer and South America in the winter.
The two brothers, originally from the Bay Area, began using hydroponics to grow produce for their restaurant while living on the Hawaiian island of Kawai. When they moved to Reno, they brought their passion for hydroponics with them. Active in local farmers markets since 2006, they have up until recently grown all their produce in-house. However, when demand for their fruits and vegetables grew past their production abilities, they to expand.
The Blounts were referred to the Nevada Small Business Development Center, and shortly thereafter a counselor took special interest in their project. By coordinating with the UNR Agriculture Department, the Blounts were allowed to lease University land and build greenhouses on the Agriculture department facilities in exchange for opening their project to research by UNR students and faculty. Although, UNR currently has no hydroponics department, through cooperation with the Blounts, UNR hopes to expand its research to include hydroponics and provide a location for hands-on training.
The Blounts plan to investigate the nutritional differences between regularly grown produce, organics and hydroponics. And the location couldn’t be better; the arid climate of Nevada is perfect for both hydroponic research and the commercial growth of a food production method that requires significantly less water.
At the time of this article, the Blounts have two (out of a planned total of four) greenhouses built, one of which has been growing plants for almost three weeks. Perhaps most impressive is the volume of vegetables that can be produced in a 2100 square foot greenhouse.
“This greenhouse will actually produce 10,000 pounds per month of product,” says Tom, smiling. “[Normal means of production] are hard because you’re only going to get one or two crops, and maybe only 500 pounds, per year.”
“There’s no reason that Northern Nevada can’t grow all its own vegetables,” says John.
In fact the brothers welcome and encourage competition, especially when it results in a stimulation of hydroponic growth within our community. Large economic and environmental stimuli exist for the creation of a self-sufficient Nevada The Blounts, eager to teach their practice to the public, will be holding seminars, open to the public, on the last Saturday of every month. Additionally, John and Tom are working with the World Bank to develop planned greenhouses by which small villages across the world can affordably grow enough food to support themselves.
In all, John and Tom Blount are into something great. And while they surely know it, they are incredibly generous and highly interested in helping others and refining a method of food production that could do great things for Nevada and beyond. I look forward to watching their progress and almost assured success.
Success story compiled and written by Cecil “Chuck” McCumber – Graduate Assistant – Nevada Small Business Development Center