Heat Maps Show Largest Greenhouse Farm in North Korea At Less Than Half Capacity

The farm was said to be the area’s rebound from severe flooding, but it’s not fully operational, analysts say.

By Noh Jung Min for RFA

Months after North Korea unveiled the country’s largest-ever greenhouse farm, analysts told Radio Free Asia that satellite imagery shows less than half of the farm is operational, likely due to power shortages.

According to state media, the country’s leader Kim Jong Un personally guided the construction of the Sinuiju Greenhouse Farm Complex. It has been touted as a way to rejuvenate Wihwa, Mado and Kumdong islands in the Yalu River, near the border with China, which were leveled by flooding in 2024.

At the farm complex’ dedication in February, Kim acknowledged the floods as being the heaviest on record, but said the project overcame nature to create “from which our people will benefit for all ages.”

Months after North Korea unveiled the country’s largest-ever greenhouse farm, analysts told Radio Free Asia that satellite imagery shows less than half of the farm is operational, likely due to power shortages. — Satellite imagery from the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Sentinel-2C shows long rectangular greenhouse structures arranged in neat, parallel rows, with grid-patterned internal roads, research buildings, and management facilities visible throughout the complex. Analyzed by Bruce Songhak Chung Credit:RFA

At a gargantuan 450 hectares (1.7 square miles), the Farm Complex is roughly the size of 625 soccer fields, and authorities claim it can produce vegetables eight months out of the year.

But thermal infrared imagery from NASA’s Landsat-8 satellite suggests that only 44% of the total complex was registering temperatures above the surrounding average, Bruce Songhak Chung, a researcher at the Seoul-based Institute for National Security Strategy, told RFA.

He told Radio Free Asia that after seeing the thermal data from March 10 that the unheated areas were evidence that either heating infrastructure has not been fully installed or that chronic electricity shortages are preventing the greenhouses from operating at full capacity.

Chung also examined nighttime light imagery (VIIRS) captured by the U.S. Suomi NPP weather satellite at approximately 1:30 a.m. on April 17, finding almost no detectable light emanating from the Sinuiju Greenhouse Farm. The electric grow-lights typically used in smart farming operations were largely absent — a finding consistent with reports of frequent power shortages due to poor electricity infrastructure inside the country.

Kim Hyuk, a senior researcher specializing in North Korean agriculture at the South Korea-based Korea Rural Community Corporation’s Rural Research Institute, told RFA that the heat maps showed only parts of the farm were getting power.

“What can be analyzed through nighttime light and thermal infrared imagery at the Sinuiju Greenhouse Farm suggests just one unit equipped with solar panels and five glass greenhouse units — covering only about 25 hectares (0.1 square miles),” he said. “The rest is closer to basic plastic coverings than properly equipped greenhouses, and the electricity that can be generated from the solar installation is not sufficient to meet the farm’s power demands.”

Kim noted that Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) imagery taken on April 19 visually confirmed that crops appear to have been planted across most of the greenhouse units, suggesting an operational rate of roughly 65–75% — somewhat higher than what thermal infrared data alone indicated.

Despite the more optimistic imagery, whether the farm can actually deliver on the authorities’ claim of eight or more months of annual harvests through solar power and geothermal systems remains an open question.

South Korean satellite imagery analysis firm SI Analytics reached a similar conclusion in its own assessment published in March, warning that the large-scale complex risks becoming a “ghost greenhouse” during winter months.

In its report, SI Analytics wrote that while the Sinuiju Greenhouse Farm is now being heavily promoted as a model for regional development to showcase achievements in “improving the people’s standard of living” however, it is expected to face significant practical challenges.

The primary issue is the supply of essential energy sources such as coal, heavy oil, and electricity required for its operation. Greenhouses are facilities primarily used in winter, yet this region is a flat border area in the northernmost part of North Korea, making it one of the country’s coldest locations, the report said.

Edited by Eugene Whong.