The two words vertical and gardening may seem questionable to many people. However, it’s becoming an increasingly popular trend within urban areas to promote the environment. Surprisingly, they offer some immense benefits and today we’re going to discuss these. But, before we get into that, what is a vertical garden?
A vertical garden, commonly known as a “green wall” is an upright structure covered in vegetation. Typically, these walls are found in urban areas where free space is hard to come by. From this, the people living within the area and the environment get offered some great benefits.
The whole concept behind vertical gardening is something I most definitely adore. It’s a great idea, and it’s becoming an insanely popular architectural routine. Apart from them looking astonishing, vertical gardens can actually provide some rather great benefits to both us and the environment. To better understand this, below we discuss this topic in greater detail.
How do vertical gardens help the environment?
Now onto the “fun” part of the post, and this is the benefits that vertical gardening can provide our environment. Without a doubt, you’ll be amazed by the advantages this type of concept can offer. Don’t believe me? Check out for yourself below.
1.Purifies air uniquely
As you can grasp from the above, most of these vertical gardens or green walls are found in urban areas. A rather exciting statistic for you is that over 50% of the population actually live in cities. Now, you know this. You’ll better understand the reason why we need vertical gardening to purify the air.
Due to this ever-rising number increasing yearly, greenhouse gases are becoming progressively higher in cities than in non-urban areas. Although introducing this type of gardening can’t eliminate this issue, it can help reduce it.
Vegetation will forever be known as air purifiers as they breathe in greenhouse gases and exhale oxygen. Because of this, developing these gardens up walls, in non-used billboards, and other vertical places can help reduce greenhouse emissions in urban areas.
2.Reduces ambient temperature
During the photosynthesis process, plants absorb and reflect sunlight. Only around 45% of sunlight is absorbed from this cycle, but it can reduce the temperature of where they’re placed.
Think about it this way, when you’re sunbathing on the beach, you’re probably receiving almost 100% of the energy provided by the sun. However, when plants obstruct you from the sun, they’re taking away 45% of that heat energy. Because of this, you’ll feel much cooler.
Now, I’m not saying they’ll be a 45% decrease in temperature change if you were to construct vertical gardens everywhere. But one thing it can do is minimize it ever so slightly. But, even a tiny difference in today’s age is rather significant.
3.Increase’s productivity
Something else that vertical gardens can enhance is productivity. I know what you’re thinking. How does this benefit the environment? However, humans are part of the environment. Without innovative thinking, strategic planning, and dedicated people, our environment would be destroyed entirely.
To help you better understand the importance between both plants and productivity, here are two studies that back up this point. The first one was conducted in the United Kingdom, and it shows that introducing plants into a working environment can increase productivity by 15%.
A similar test was also conducted in the United States. This one shows that almost 10% of employee sick days are the result of minimal office nature and natural light.
From these findings, we’re able to grasp the concept that by crafting vertical gardens, you can reduce the amount people who are sick and increase their workflow. By providing each of these benefits, our economy can develop faster.
4.Reduces noise levels
A rather strange benefit that not many people are aware of is that vertical gardens can reduce noise levels. It isn’t proven how much by, but experts say it’s quite a substantial amount. Although this benefit can seem like it only improves the living of the elderly, there’s much more to it.
Noise pollution is commonly known as the silent killer. According to the European Environment Agency (EEA), noise is accountable for 16,600 premature deaths and over 72,000 hospitalizations each year. Apart from harming humans, this can also have an adverse effect on our wildlife.
Although many people will conclude this to festivals or music events, there are many more worst noise pollutants. To understand this better, see below urban examples:
- Road traffic – A single car horn can produce between 90 – 100 DBS.
- Air traffic – For overhead air traffic, a single aircraft can generate around 130 DBS.
- Construction – Large building sites like car parks, apartment blocks, etc., can be rather bad for noise pollutants. For example, a pneumatic drill can produce around 110 DBS.
- Catering and nightlife – Restaurants, bars, or nightclubs can generate a lot of noise. However, on average, it’s around 100 DBS.
5.They’re fire retardant
Again, another unique benefit is that vertical gardens can be considered natural fire retardants. This is because vegetation retains moisture, so it’s able to grow and perform photosynthesis. As we’re aware, fire’s worst enemy is water, as it’s unable to spread or ignite.
Although most modern buildings are covered head to toe with fire retardant materials, layering a vertical garden on the walls can provide it with added security. However, if the vertical garden is left to dry out, it could actually contribute to the fire.
6.Can increase property value
The next benefit is that it can increase the property value, making the economy much healthier. Green walls are a part of a revolutionary design trend. People worldwide are slowly becoming more in touch with nature and will pay that little bit of extra cash to do so.
Vertical gardens are also looked at as “high class.” This is because they’re found in luxury hotels, clubs, shopping centers, and much more. From this, if you were to implement a good-looking vertical garden onto your property, you can see an increase in value.
According to this post, having plants in and around a house can increase the value by 20%. By people wanting to pay this additional price, it gives them an incentive also to follow suit. From this, more and more vertical gardens will start getting constructed, which can offer an astronomical number of
7.Increases mental and physical wellbeing
When people are happy and motivated, actions take place, and things change dramatically. From this, a snowball-like effect occurs, and our environment can also start to gain these benefits. As plants reduce the amount of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the air, they can offer us a healthier living.
Apart from this, to have a visually pleasing vertical garden, it must be taken care of. If you have your own, you’re able to perform this action yourself. Although green walls are incredibly low-maintenance, they still require some care and attention. From this, you’re able to introduce daily exercise into your life in the form of gardening.
8.Helps support groundwater levels
Something else that vertical gardens offer is rain buffer. Although that might sound rather peculiar, it’s a somewhat beneficial factor that both us humans and the environment can benefit from. According to this post, the number one weather-related killer is a flash flood. Flash floods occur from slow-moving thunderstorms, which overfill lakes, rivers, and other water sources, causing a mass flood.
However, what vertical gardens can achieve, is making the falling process slower between the rain and the floor. From this, less water is reaching the ground at any given time. If there were enough of these vertical gardens in major cities, these types of floods are unlikely to happen.
9.Minimal maintenance
Another great benefit to having vertical gardens is that they require minimal maintenance. This is because of their drainage systems, as plants can feed each other this valuable resource. For example, the top plants of the green wall will receive water and filter out what they don’t need. This water will then drop onto the plants below and so on.
Apart from being easily maintainable, it also reduces the number of resources needed to cater to them because of their sharing capabilities. For example, watering a flat square garden will need much more water than your standard vertical garden.
10.Less vandalism
It goes without saying, thousands if not millions, are put into community gardens, only to get vandalized by people. Although it’s a tiny minority of people, the results can be devastating for both the environment and the grower.
If we can reduce the amount of vandalism that occurs, we can provide longer living and more sustainable gardens. As green walls can provide this, it’s more of a reason why you should opt-in for them.
11.Uses minimal water and electricity consumption
We briefly mentioned above that these types of gardens require much less water. This is because they’re usually placed in superb places like billboards or on the side of buildings, etc. Because of this, they typically have a sufficient amount of sunlight, so you don’t need to grow these artificially.
So, considering it can offer all of the above benefits, they also use a minimal number of resources needed to grow them. This is a superb advance, as many new ways of growing use masses amounts of electricity. This includes large industrial vertical growing warehouses. Although they try to counteract this issue with solar panels and wind turbines, they still use a significant amount of energy to power the grow lights.
12.Can offer better healing
Something that amazes me about plants and green walls is that they can decrease the chances of illness. According to this post, introducing plants into an environment can reduce the possibility of illness symptoms occurring by 25 percent. After all, a healthier community can only mean one thing, more innovative changes to our environment.
13.Maximizes limited space
In cities, ground space is somewhat limited. Because of this, the only free ground is up. Due to vertical gardens being able to grow practically anywhere as long as it’s supplied enough resources, this is absolutely perfect.
It goes without saying that because these types of gardens can be planted anywhere, it gives them an advantage point. Without a doubt, this is the best way to introduce gardening to an urban or crowded area. From growing this way, there isn’t really any excuse not to get involved.
14.You’re able to grow more plants
Again, bouncing from space, you’re able to grow a ridiculous amount more. To help you understand this example, take Manhattan’s Empire State, for example. In total, it’s around 209,000 square meters in size, which is approximately 29 soccer pitches. Because of this, if the interior wall and the exterior of the building were covered in vegetation, you’ll get tons more plants in Manhattan.
This is just one skyscraper, and this doesn’t include all the other ones found in America, England, Europe, Asia, etc. If they were all to contribute to this type of cause, the results would be astounding.
15.Insulates buildings
A vertical garden can actually insulate your home as well. This is because you’re able to use them as windbreaks, shade, and much more. By doing this, you’re able to stop the effects cold weather has on your home during the winter months, which will reduce your heating bill. On the other side, it can be used as a shade during the summer. From this, you’re minimizing the amount your house heats up, which again will reduce your bills.
16.Disease prevention
Because the plants will be above ground, they won’t be introduced to any ground-related diseases. From this, it can dramatically decrease the chances of them becoming disease-ridden. Not to mention that trellising climbing plants can slow down the spread of many soil-borne fungus and diseases.
It goes without saying, reducing disease can ultimately lead to a longer and healthier life for plants. The longer they live, the more advantages they’re able to provide us and our environment.
17.Better airflow
Something that many people are unaware of is the importance of airflow and vegetation. Believe it or not, plants can suffocate, just like we can. You may have experienced this before. When you’re in a crowded and hot room, it becomes hard to breathe, and this is the same for plants.
Airflow is vital because if the humidity levels rise due to the lack of air, it can block their pores. As a result of this, when the pores get clogged, they cannot breathe anymore. If this occurs, they can die.
Apart from supplying it a place to breathe, it can also reduce the following from occurring:
- Pests – Because outdoor airflow will be pretty strong, pests will find it hard to feed off your plants. From this, you’ll see a dramatic decrease in the number of pests that’ll try to steal your plant’s sap.
- Strength – A slight breeze can also help the plant’s roots to become much more substantial. A lack of this may result in poor conditioning and weak roots or stems.
- Pollination – Because the plant is healthy from excellent airflow, it minimizes the possibilities of becoming unfit for pollination. Failing to supply airflow to plants can result in pollen being clumped up in the blooms and unharvestable.
- Output – From proving these ideal living conditions for plants, we can receive maximum output from them. Because of this, we can plant less and retrieve more.
As you can see, the benefits of airflow are immense and something all gardeners should be thinking about. Luckily for vertical gardens, this isn’t a problem as they’re typically supplied with a sufficient amount of air.
18.Pest prevention
By getting your plants off the ground, will keep them away from plant-loving pests. Because of the reduction of pests, diseases, and much more, many gardeners love the thought of vertical gardening. From doing this, you produce much healthier plants that can flourish remarkably well. This gives our environment immense benefits, as we don’t have to use harmful pesticides to reduce this from occurring.
19.Larger harvests
From the added benefits above, plants and vegetables can grow much larger. After all, if you provide sufficient living conditions to plants over an extended period of time, they can grow much better. Because vertical gardening can achieve this, you can get more from your plants. This provides an astronomical number of benefits as larger plants offer the most amount of value.
20.Cleaner crops
As you can imagine, by minimizing the number of harmful chemicals used that reduce disease, pests, or aid growth, you’re able to produce cleaner crops. This is great as the more chemicals we use to grow vegetation, the worst it is for our environment.
From the above, you can start to develop the concept of how vertical gardening can help the environment.
How vertical gardens can influence the environment of a space?
If you haven’t noticed already, vertical gardens are a superb way to give back to our environment. It goes without saying that we can develop a much greener future from implementing this type of gardening. Apart from the above benefits that can aid our climate, how does vertical gardening help influence the environment of space?
It’s everywhere
Unlike many places in the world which are overcrowded, there’s one space that isn’t. Yep, you guessed it, vertical. Because of this, we can grow an astronomical amount of more plants that can help aid the environment.
One of the main advantages we’ll receive from this is the reduction of global warming. For those who don’t know, plants, vegetables, and trees help slow the rate of this severe climate issue. The way they counteract this is because of the following:
- CO2 is a greenhouse gas that is used to trap heat from the sun on earth. As you can imagine, the more CO2 found on earth, the less heat can escape, meaning the earth will be much warmer. However, plants reduce this as they breathe in CO2 and exhale oxygen.
- There are many more greenhouse gases that stop heat from leaving the earth. Again, plants, vegetables, and trees can all inhale this type of gas and prevent global warming from becoming a deadly issue.
It protects our wildlife
Another dramatic advantage that is provided by vertical gardens is that it introduces wildlife back into our urban areas. Before cities were built and fully established, there was luscious green land, fields, and trees, but as humans have wiped this out, we’ve minimized the amount of space our wildlife can live in.
However, by providing these green walls, we’re able to invite them back into our busy urban areas. Wildlife like birds, bees, and butterflies, will feel much more reluctant to come back to these areas.
This will also offer a safe haven for pollinators, which are insects we must protect at all costs. According to this post, 1/3 of all our food consumed on a daily basis is the result of pollination-related insects.
It can lower our carbon footprint
Lastly, it can dramatically lower our carbon footprint. Many urban areas around the world don’t have access to local produce. Because of this, food and other valuable resources have to travel from overseas or across the country for our shelves to be stocked.
It must undergo “on average” 1,500 miles of travel for fresh food to be delivered to our doors. This figure is based on each food choice, for example, carrots (1,500 miles), broccoli (1,500 miles), and so on. Because of this substantial amount of mileage traveled to offer us somewhat fresh food, it causes harmful effects on our planet.
To reduce this dramatically, growing locally with such things as green walls can help reduce this matter.
Conclusion
As you can see from the above, there are many reasons why vertical gardening can benefit our environment. Without a doubt, it’s something that’ll be implemented globally across many major cities. In fact, it’s already starting to take place.
With both green walls, and buildings being introduced, I can certainly see this architectural design expanding into something extraordinary. Currently, it’s a rather unique trend, so people will pay a pretty cent for it. However, as time progresses, I’m sure this will become a norm, and properties that include this type of design will slowly level out in price.
So, after reading this post, what should you do now? Consider making your own vertical garden. You never know, it can dramatically increase your property’s price and also benefit the planet.
