Vertical Farm Cost Estimator and Planner

Plan the space and components

The four-step planner supports a modular growing room, a commercial facility, or an existing-space retrofit. Use Next, Back, or the step buttons to review the scenario, scope, budget, and enquiry. Dimensions and lighting assumptions describe a planning scenario, not a crop-yield guarantee.

Length and width accept 0.1–1,000 metres or feet; optional height accepts 1–100 in the same unit. Coverage is 5–90% and tiers are a whole number from 1–20. Feet are converted to metres; calculated floor and canopy areas are displayed in square metres.

Lighting inputs are PPFD 25–1,500 μmol/m²/s, 1–24 light hours/day, fixture efficacy 0.5–5 μmol/J, delivery 20–100%, and 1–365 whole light-days/year. The optional electricity rate is 0–5 CAD/kWh. Eight optional core allowances accept 0–1 billion CAD each; selected equipment quantities are whole numbers from 0–1,000.

Understand the budget and energy estimate

Core allowances and selected equipment have separate subtotals. Enter allowances carefully so the same equipment is not counted twice. Equipment prices do not scale automatically with floor area. Blank allowances and the initially blank electricity rate mean those costs have not been provided, not that the project has no cost.

The lighting estimate covers lighting electricity only. It excludes HVAC, dehumidification, pumps, fans, cold storage, demand or fixed electricity charges, and other operating costs. No general operating-cost or profit forecast, tax allowance, or contingency is calculated. Confirm design, crop requirements, rates, taxes, installation, and all remaining scope directly before making a project decision.

Checked lighting example

At 12 m × 8 m, floor area is 96 m². With 60% productive coverage and four tiers, productive footprint is 57.6 m² and lit canopy is 230.4 m². PPFD 250 μmol/m²/s for 18 hours gives a daily light integral of 16.2 mol/m²/day.

With fixture efficacy 3 μmol/J and delivery 85%, lighting power is 230.4 × 250 ÷ (3 × 0.85) ÷ 1,000 = 22.588235 kW. At 18 hours/day and 365 days, this is 148,404.705882 kWh/year. Entering the example rate CAD 0.15/kWh gives CAD 22,260.71/year for lighting only. The rate is an example entered by the user; the actual default is blank.

The formulas are canopy = floor area × coverage × tiers; DLI = PPFD × hours × 0.0036; lighting kW = canopy × PPFD ÷ (efficacy × delivery) ÷ 1,000; annual kWh = kW × hours × days. Coverage and delivery are fractions in these formulas. Company/partner review records and a named technical reviewer have not been supplied; the example is an arithmetic check, not independent validation of a design.

Save, reopen, reset, and share

Save project downloads JSON. Open accepts a saved JSON file up to 30 KB and validates it before replacing the scenario. Reset example requires a second confirming click, restores scenario defaults, leaves electricity and core allowances blank, and resets equipment quantities to zero.

Review the prepared enquiry before using Copy enquiry, the text download, Print, or Email draft. The email control opens a draft in your mail application; it does not send the message. A calculated result or download is not an enquiry submitted to Canada Agro Farming.

If the planner does not load, contact Canada Agro Farming with the location, crops, space, utilities, and budget questions. Keep saved project files before replacing or resetting a scenario.