Sustainable Automated Aquaponics

Print HTML
Official Dosomething.org Project

Vital Stats

Jonah E

Erie, CO
  • people helped350
  • People Doing It 1

The Problem

US imports of fish are much higher than fish grown domestically. This increases the distance that food has to travel to get to the US, damaging the atmosphere from the release of fossil fuels. There are also problems with growing fish in conventional farms in the US. Some practices of growing fish are unsustainable and contribute to environmental pollution. Plants in the US, when grown conventionally are also unsustainably produced. They are fertilized by petrochemical based fertilizers, which cause eutrophication downstream in the Gulf of Mexico. If only there was a way to address all of these problems in one simple and effective solution...

Plan of Action

I plan on building a sustainable and mostly automated aquaponics system at my school. This system will have a 150-200 gallon fish tank and a 4'x4' hydroponic growing bed. I am planning on producing around 10 full sized tilapia and about 20 heads of lettuce. I am also going to attempt to automate the system by hooking up a temperature sensor, pH sensor, and automatic feeder that will automatically keep the water and fish at optimum levels. I will then show this off to my entire school and promote the idea of growing your own food in an urban environment sustainably.
Go
Sustainability

Related Stuff