Urd G. Bak1, Juliana Arias2, Floor Marsman1, Magni Laksáfoss2, Unn Laksá2 and Ólavur Gregersen1
1Ocean Rainforest Sp/F, Mjölkargøta 20, FO-180 Kaldbak, the Faroe Islands, 2Sjókovin, Bryggjan 6, FO-520 Leirvík, Faroe Islands
Correspondence; Urd Grandorf Bak, urd@oceanrainforest.com
The EU Horizon 2020 funded project AquaVitae has, among other things, investigated how to upscale open ocean kelp cultivation. The company Ocean Rainforest Sp/F (ORF) has been the key industrial partner to lead this work. ORF cultivate kelp in the Faroe Islands in high wave and exposed areas using a well-tested macroalgal cultivation rig (MACR). The company’s activities span the entire supply chain from producing seeding material to cultivating at sea to processing into storage stable products for the food and feed market. For the past years, ORF has been cultivating at small scale (<300 tonnes wet weight/year) but is expanding its production. The environment around the Faroe Islands has a stable sea temperature and allows for multiple partial harvesting of Saccharina latissima with up to six harvests without re-seeding of the grow lines. This has the potential to reduce production costs significantly. However, upscaling of production and cost-efficient logistics are required to exploit the seaweed biomass. AquaVitae has addressed some of these challenges, partly by further developing the state-of-the-art cultivation technics and processing facilities, and partly by investigating the possibilities to expand seaweed production in the Atlantic Ocean. Finally, AquaVitae examined the economic feasibility for a sound operation of the MACR for producing S. latissima. This will be analyzed considering different production setups to optimize the economic efficiency of this cultivation technic.