33 meters beneath a London street, inside tunnels built during World War II, a farm grows salads and herbs using LED, without sun, without soil, and with 70% less water than a conventional garden.

Written by Flavia Marinho

Published on 24/04/2026 at 20:09

5 people reacted to this.

The tunnels were built in 1940 to protect Londoners from German bombs and were abandoned for 70 years until two entrepreneurs decided to plant salad 33 meters below the asphalt

In 1940, as German bombs fell on London, thousands of people rushed down to underground shelters dug tens of meters deep. The Clapham tunnels, in the south of the city, could house up to 8,000 people per night.

When the war ended, the tunnels were sealed and forgotten. For 70 years, no one went down there, until in 2015, Richard Ballard and Steven Dring had an idea that seemed crazy: to turn the tunnels into a farm.

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No sun, no soil, no pesticide: how plants grow in the dark

The plants grow in trays stacked on metal shelves. Instead of soil, they use hydroponics: the roots are submerged in nutrient water.

Instead of sun, special LED lamps emit exactly the wavelengths plants need for photosynthesis.

Temperature, humidity, and irrigation are computer-controlled; there are no pests, because no insect survives 33 meters underground.

Result: zero pesticide. Zero herbicide. Zero fungus. Water is recirculated in a closed circuit, spending 70% less than an open-air garden, and since the temperature down there is naturally stable, between 16 and 18 degrees all year round, the cost of climate control is minimal.

What they grow and who they sell to

Growing Underground specializes in microgreens: young shoots of arugula, cilantro, mustard, radish, and other plants.

These shoots are harvested a few days after germination, when they are at their peak flavor and nutrients.

London’s premium restaurants love the product because it arrives fresh on the same day.

Supermarket chains Tesco and Waitrose already buy from the farm.

Logistics is a natural advantage: the farm is located within London. It doesn’t need refrigerated trucks coming from another country.

From harvest to supermarket, the product can arrive in a few hours.

The partnership with the Alan Turing Institute

To optimize production, Growing Underground partnered with the Alan Turing Institute, a British center for data science and artificial intelligence.

Engineers and data scientists analyze plant information in real time. Sensors measure growth rate, nutrient absorption, and lamp efficiency.

With this data, the team adjusts conditions to maximize production with minimal resources, an example of precision agriculture done 33 meters underground.

The historical irony: from bomb shelter to farm of the future

The Clapham tunnels were designed to save lives during the war. Eighty years later, they are helping to feed the city in another way.

The infrastructure already existed. The reinforced concrete walls, ventilation, emergency accesses.

Ballard and Dring didn’t need to build anything from scratch. They simply adapted what was already there.

This reuse of historical infrastructure is a model that other cities are starting to copy.

In Paris, abandoned metro tunnels are being studied for the same purpose. In New York, the Lowline project aims to create an underground park.

Limitations of the model

The underground farm does not solve world hunger. Microgreens are a premium niche, not a staple food.

The cost of electricity for LED lamps is significant, even though they are efficient, and the production scale is still limited compared to an open-air farm.

But as a model of urban agriculture, climate-resilient and zero-waste, Growing Underground shows a way forward.

In a world where cities concentrate more and more people and agricultural lands are increasingly distant, growing under the asphalt can make sense, and who would have thought that the tunnels of the Second World War would be the future of food.

33 meters beneath a London street, inside tunnels built during World War II, a farm grows salads and herbs using LED, without sun, without soil, and with 70% less water than a conventional garden.

No sun, no soil, no pesticide: how plants grow in the dark

What they grow and who they sell to

The partnership with the Alan Turing Institute

The historical irony: from bomb shelter to farm of the future

Limitations of the model

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33 meters beneath a London street, inside tunnels built during World War II, a farm grows salads and herbs using LED, without sun, without soil, and with 70% less water than a conventional garden.

No sun, no soil, no pesticide: how plants grow in the dark

What they grow and who they sell to

The partnership with the Alan Turing Institute

The historical irony: from bomb shelter to farm of the future

Limitations of the model

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With billions in loans, China is rebuilding Nigeria’s railway network from scratch, abandoning the British colonial tracks that have turned to scrap and creating a corridor of over 1,300 km to take the load off the roads of Africa’s largest economy.

Austrian engineers have developed an inflatable concrete technology that transforms flat slabs into domes using only air pressure, eliminating scaffolding and temporary forms, and potentially changing the way bridges, tunnels, and curved roofs are constructed worldwide.

Australia prepares to dredge 96.5 million m³ in Moreton Bay to deepen, widen, and realign channels of the Port of Brisbane, in a project of up to 25 years designed to accommodate larger ships and enhance maritime safety and regional port efficiency.

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