The average American meal has a shockingly large carbon footprint, usually traveling 1,500 miles to the plate and emitting large amounts of CO2 in the process, according to the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. Each meal created produces 275 pounds of waste a day, making restaurants the worst aggressors of greenhouse gas emissions in retail industry, says the Boston-based Green Restaurant Association [GRA], a non-profit organization that works to create an ecologically sustainable restaurant industry.

A recent NRA [National Restaurant Association] study shows utility costs are a big line item for restaurateurs, accounting for a median of between 2.3 percent and 3.6 percent of sales, depending on the type of operation.

According to Zagat’s 2007 America’s Top Restaurants, 65 percent of surveyors said they would pay more for food that has been sustainably raised or procured. According to 2007 National Restaurant Association research, 62 percent of adults said they would likely choose a restaurant based on its environmental friendliness.

Discussed in the article, which focuses on the Washington DC market, Chef Todd Gray of Equinox (Washington, DC), Chef Barton Seaver of Hook (Washington, DC), Chef Nora Pouillon Restaurant Nora (Washington, DC), Tom Holland of Juice Joint Café, George Velazquez of Napa 1015, Citronelle (Washington, DC), and Maziar Farivar of Peacock Grand. Also briefly mentioned, Sweetgreen, Le Pain Quotidien and CakeLove and JavaGreen both working with Clean Currents.

More on Fish from around the web: The Chronicle (twice), Foodhoe, Sausalitoeats, Yelp, Metroactive, Citysearch, Tripadvisor, Fork and Bottle , and Off the Meat Hook, which gives us our conclusion: “Delicious but crazy expensive”

As reported, the 30-story facility is large enough to feed 72,000 people. That’s about 13% of the population of Las Vegas – 8 of these (for $1.6 billion) is enough to feed the city (feeding the tourists is another problem). It would take about 4200 of these to feed the country (303,300,000 / 72,000). They’re anticipating $25 million from produce and $15 million from tourists. Presumably the tourist revenue will drop off as these things spring up like weeds. Ignoring tourists and pesky things like inflation, and with a stated annual operating cost of $6 million, the farm complex would break even in about 10.5 years ($200M / $19M net/year).

The most-often-cited source (Next Energy News) reports that “Revenue from the 30 story Vertical Farm would approach $40 Annually” – an obvious typo. At Restaurant Reformer we’re sure that’s supposed to be $40 million.

For those counting food-miles as a measure of sustainability, building a farm near the city could be a very good thing. As a contained environment, things like pests are excluded physically and seasons are irrelevant. There’s a lot to be said for farming in a building, but what’s the real story?

For that, the Restaurant Reformer follows the breadcrumbs to Dr. Dickson Despommier’s vertical farm site, where we find an economic analysis that appears to have a bit more research behind it (thanks to Jackie Baumgartner, Locky Chambers, Alexis Harman, Jun Mitsumoto and Jordana Rothschild). This material is the basis for some more-respectable stories on the subject, including New York Magazine, CNN, Wired, and the BBC.

Despommier’s numbers are a bit different – a 21-story building that costs $84 million to build, $13.5 million/year in pre-tax revenue from lettuce. That gets into the black a lot faster than the Vegas theory (84 / 13.5 = 6.25 years).

They’ve done all the heavy lifting over at Despommier’s vertical farm site, so we’ll leave the expertise to the experts. The story got picked up and carried around the net, so that suggests there’s some interest in the idea – even if it’s not happening in Vegas today.

More on the Mercury Café at the BBC, the Denver Post, and Greenprint Denver.