What am I building?

I call it a "calorie fountain" — an indoor farming system that can feed a small family and fit within a single room of a suburban home.

Early systems won't be as efficient, but in the long term, a calorie fountain should be able to supply the full nutritional needs of three adults, all year, and cost less than $200/month to operate.

I also hope to build a community of fountaineers who are intrigued by the idea and want to get involved. If that's you, Step 1 is to engage in the comments.

Why am I building it?

1/5 of children in Canada go to bed hungry at least once a week because their families can't afford groceries. But current indoor farming ventures seem focused on leafy "supplemental" crops — growing salads for the middle class — because that's where the money is that can provide a return for their investors.

I think that same technology could be used to bring food security to those who don't already have it, by showing them how to build a system for themselves that makes them nutritionally self-sufficient. Forever.

Navigation

All the work I'm doing to develop the calorie fountain will be posted here. This site will always be up-to-date with the most recent plans and suggestions, and can be downloaded onto a laptop or even a thumb drive and viewed in your browser in any operating system and without having to install any other tools.

The site is organized into 3 main sections:

  • Lab Notes - Think of these as the project water cooler. It's where you'll find ideas, thoughts about the project, links to related materials, and minor status updates about my active investigations.
  • Targets - Think of these as "Reports to Management." These are the more official posts I make to declare specific project goals and track progress toward them.
  • Results - The point of the whole project — get the plans and build a calorie fountain for yourself.

Get Involved

Think I'm crazy? Me too, but I'd love to hear your reasons. So go ahead. Tell me what I've missed, and then, who knows? May we can resolve those problems without having to throw out the entire thing.

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