PeaceJam Infinity Hydroponics Lab
3

with

West Chicago

Aug. 30, 2022

About this Act

A few years back, the local General Mills Plant shut down, leaving many people in our town jobless. Soon after, rates of poverty and hunger began to increase around our town of West Chicago. This has also been exacerbated by the Covid-19 Crisis.

On top of that, there were few options for food insecure people in our community. After helping restore a nearby building into a new food pantry, we decided that there needed to be more options for healthy produce. That was how the project was dreamt to life. We started by creating a large community-garden with the generous support of St. Michael's UCC.

The produce from the garden is donated to our local food pantry. After starting the garden though, we realized that people were in need of other sources of fresh produce year-round. That is how we began our hydroponics lab in the basement of that same local food pantry. The project took a lot of resourcefulness as well as trial & error.

Guided by our club advisor Alex Golovin though, we soon were able to set-up several hydroponics systems. On these systems, we harvest dozens of bags of lettuce about every two weeks. Along the way, we've continued to set-up new systems and branch into new types of lettuce as well as herbs. The lab also serves as a space for us to incubate seedlings.

Our hope is to continue growing more types of foods & increase our yield. We would also love to eventually use this space to teach others about hydroponics and healthy gardening.

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