Adapting To A Changing World

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Our climate is changing. Debates rage about this change being due to our nastier habits or natural climatic conditions in concert with the sun. Regardless, we are seeing serious impact, even here in the United States with serous drought conditions in many areas including where I live; The American Southwest. * Cutting back on our polluting ways is important. It isn't enough. We need to show adaptability in case it is the sun that is doing this. Below are some ideas for adaptation to climate change while we clean up our ways so no one goes hungry or thirsty meanwhile... * Ways to adapt our Agriculture to a changing world: * One popular concept is vertical-farming*, tall multistory complexes growing crops; a proposal that calls for high investment that will most likely not be made during this recession. * We should therefore have lots of "mini vertical-farms"*, or indoor hydroponics outfits that can be kitted out on the cheaper, a whole lot cheaper. One room can become quite profitable if one grows the high dollar crops. If you get the high dollar crops off the land, that leaves more land and water to use for basic food crops. The samples of farming indoors on the cheap are legion, but the Mods time is valuable, so I have two links. * If we go at it like a ton of bricks now, yes we can. I say yes because we already have a blooming industry that, while not legal, is certainly 'blooming'. There are houses that are vacant except for dozens if not hundreds of pot plants growing away under pumps & lights. Admittedly, most of those are rather expensive propositions; the secrecy making the cost a requirement. * If pot heads can do this, why not the rest of agriculture? Vegetables don't require the secrecy of extralegal pot, so it can be done right out in the open to take advantage of the Southwestern sun. * Basically, a mini vertical-indoor farm is a souped up hydroponics system set up, outside, indoors, or out in a tent, something we already have going in a small way to grow off-season tomatoes (that I know of) and fancy flowers. * The major cutback on water use is the enclosed nature of a hydroponic system. Plants are given water, and then the unused water is recycled for reuse, not lost to the ground or evaporation as is ground agriculture we see today. Start in California, Arizona, & Nevada with the high dollar crops typically grown here. Get them off the ground. Ground farming is wasteful plus crops can come in contact with animal waste. This method also pulls pressure off the staples until we can get to them. * The crops I'm talking about, the ones that are the proving ground for the feasibility of this, are not the sort of crops that keep people from starvation's door. These are the crops that people pay to get fresh, often out of season in their location, and the growing of is already threatened. The set ups can literally be set up with just plastic pipes, tents, plastic green houses, and non-electric gravity driven pumps on land that is already set aside for those fancy veggies. The plastic or transparent parachute cloth will make abundant use of what those states have in abundance; sun. * Solar hothouses dotted all over the country for veggies pulls stress off our transportation infrastructure that is vulnerable to both terrorism and high gas costs. Colder climates may need sturdier materials for their hothouses. * Once the pampered fruits and veggies show that this is feasible and affordable, staple cereal crops probably will fall in line.