Project into 3D imaging creates potential for the aquaculture sector

Experts in underwater imaging technology are trialling the use of a system that could see 3D digital models being used by Scottish seafood producers, to map out and monitor complex marine environments.

Led by Tritonia Scientific with support from the Lyell Centre at Heriot-Watt university, seafood producer Mowi and the Sustainable Aquaculture Innovation Centre (SAIC), the company is testing the effectiveness of using remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) to create digital twins of the seabed.

Over the next 12 months, Tritonia will be developing a digital record of hard substrate found at selected Mowi sites, using a technique known as georeferenced photogrammetry. In comparison to soft seabed – where sediment samples can be taken easily – monitoring hard substrates can prove challenging because of the low visibility of the water when using dives or drop-down cameras. In addition, the hard nature of the seabed makes taking samples difficult.

"Using imaging technology could help the aquaculture sector to gain a much more detailed, accurate picture of the complex seabeds they are operating beside or above," explains Martin Sayer, managing director at Tritonia Scientific. "Our hope is that the system could ultimately support regulation and environmental monitoring in ways that would provide the levels of evidence that would be necessary for future sustainable operations."

The system will be using underwater ROVs linked to water GPS technology and acoustic transponders, all of which will work to capture digital images of the seabed to assess current and future finfish farms and identify the presence of protected habitats and essential ecosystems in Scotland's coastal seas.

Image credit: SAIC

Using these images, Tritonia will then create an accurate 3D model which will display physical characteristics and be used alongside comparison software to monitor changes to the seabed.

The company currently uses 3D photogrammetry to survey and monitor marine renewable installations, piers and harbours, and inform decommissioning programmes in the oil and sector. This project represents their first step into aquaculture and could present significant opportunities for companies in the sector to obtain accurate digital records of the seabed.

From a single ROV dive, a high number of data and images can be captured to provide producers with accurate information, such as the volume and area of geographical features. It can also be used to detect protected habitats which, while difficult to map, are an important consideration when it comes to making decisions about potential fish farm locations.

"Technology is becoming increasingly important for the aquaculture sector and collaborative research projects and trials can be an increasingly valuable demonstration of the real-world applications of new data-led techniques," says Heather Jones, CEO of SAIC. "In this case, we could see ROVs and imaging technology playing a vital role in monitoring the sector's environmental impact and increasing its economic impact by supporting future decisions about farm locations and possible expansion."

"Costal habitats are some of the most physically and biologically diverse ecosystems on our plant … Monitoring the effect of coastal industry and human activity on these habitats is crucial for understanding how best to protect them, but it remains logistically difficult," says Dr Heidi Burdett, associate professor at the Lyell Centre.

"This project will allow us to overcome this using a scalable and flexible approach that brings the seabed into a virtual laboratory," Dr Burdett concludes.

Production update on RAS facilities

NaturalShrimp has issued a production update on its facilities operating in Iowa and Texas, reporting that they are expecting production to increase in both facilities.

The retrofit and ongoing production of 20 percent the Webster City facility in Iowa has confirmed the company's patented treatment technology can adapt to existing aquaculture facilities. Production continues to increase each month and will begin stocking in an additional 20 percent this month, bringing the total production area to 40 percent of the building.

"We continue to focus on the retrofit of our production facility in Webster City and are encouraged by the confirmation of the adaptability of our treatment technology," comments Gerald Easterling, CEO of NaturalShrimp. "As we steadily increase stocking in the completed retrofits, we are confident production will rise."

Retrofit of the facility has included replacing the tank biofiltration with NaturalShrimp technology and upgrading the tank heating system. Retrofit of the remaining 60 percent of the facility will happen next, in order to increase weekly production to approximately eight kilograms by the second quarter of 2023.

Development of a hatchery at the Blairsburg facility is beginning, which will enable the company to control the post larvae supply while lowering the cost for other facilities.

At the facility in Texas, the production team were forced to cut back feeding of the shrimp after a water treatment plant fire damaged electrocoagulation equipment and drum filters. Consequently, growth of the shrimp slowed for two weeks, and production is now back on track. Expectations for production is for it to increase each month and reach a weekly total of almost three kilograms during the first quarter of 2023.

The company's patented electrocoagulation treatment is capable of removing ammonia from tanks before it converts to nitrites, without using a biofilter in a recirculating aquaculture system.

"We are pleased to announce that production has resumed using our emergency mobile treatment system in our Texas production facility with minimal delay," adds Mr Easterling. "Looking ahead, we expect to scale up regular production in the coming months."

This announcement comes a month after NaturalShrimp's report that its hydrenesis technology had been successfully applied to Hanilu Farms. You can read more about that HERE.

For more information on NaturalShrimp visit their website, HERE.

AKVA group's Egersund Net launches net cleaning service station

AKVA group's Egersund Net have announced plans for a net-cleaning service station based in Sandstrand, Norway. The project, which was planned to take place earlier, was held back as the company cited issues relating to the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.

The results of this have been "difficult contract negotiations, price increases, longer delivery times, and thus delays to the project," according to the company in a press release they put out June 29. The project was planned to happen in May this year but will now happen this August. Work is estimated to take approximately 20 weeks, from start to completion.

Local sports team IL Santor has already carried out demolition work in support of their community.

"They have done a fantastic job so far, and we believe this a good way to support the local community, which in turn benefits Tovik municipality," explains Geir Henning Risholm, service manager at AKVA group, Egersund Net. "We will probably use IL Santor again on a couple of different small projects for AKVA group, Egersund Net."

Image credit: AKVA group

"We are very happy that we are finally getting started with this exciting project at Sandstrand, which will be completed early in January 2023," says Mr Risholm. "The project and new service station will create several new jobs in the region."

In a few years from now, Egersund Net plans to have around 15 employees stationed at Sandstrand, as people have expressed interest in working there. Future new customers in the area can expect an efficient, high-quality service station for net bags and other related equipment.

"Through our best philosophy and thorough training, we shall offer strong professional services by skilled employees. In addition, we have a strong focus on the environment. With our methods and high-tech equipment, we will be running a sustainable facility," adds Mr Risholm.

AKVA group, Egersund Net's history dates back to the production of nets in the 1970s, later becoming a separate company in 1996. In recent years, the company has experienced enormous growth in terms of turnover and the number of locations. Egersund Net is now one of the leading suppliers of net technology, service, and equipment for the aquaculture industry.

For more information on AKVA group visit their website, HERE.

Aquabyte completes $25 million financing round

Aquabyte recently announced the completion of its series B financing of US$25 million, led by SoftBank Ventures Asia. Aquabyte, which uses computer vision and artificial intelligence (AI) to give fish farms insight into the health and growth of their fish, says that the funding will be used to continue its mission of transforming aquaculture to meeting growing global demand for sustainable protein.

By 2050, it is estimated that there will be a 50 percent protein gap worldwide, and farmed fish is the most sustainable and efficient protein source to fill that gap. Aquabyte has built international, cross-disciplinary teams working in fish welfare, AI and engineering, using practices drawn from salmon farms in Norway.

"Before Aquabyte, it was virtually impossible for fish farms to monitor the health of their underwater fish," explains Bryton Shang, Founder and CEO of Aquabyte. "Our engineering team solved that problem with a smart underwater camera that can accurately detect lice, monitor other welfare indicators, and identify and weigh individual fish without removing them from the water."

"Our fish welfare biologists work with our AI teams to transform those images and underwater signals into real-time data … Farms can take immediate action to improve the health and growth of their fish with less waste and fewer treatments," Mr Shang adds.

Sherman Li, Partner at SoftBank Ventures Asia, expressed that he was "proud" to be supporting Aquabyte in their journey. "By combining machine learning and computer vision with fish welfare insights, Aquabyte is leading a transformation in the aquaculture and food industry," he says.

The Nature Conservancy and Westerly Wind also joined the round as new investors.

"We firmly believe embracing technology is the solution for a more sustainable future," explains Karim Abdel-Ghaffar Plaza, Managing Partner at Westerly Winds. "Aquabyte in our opinion is a clear leader, enabling the path towards a healthier aquaculture industry needed to feed the growing world population. We're tremendously excited to be backing the team and business in the years to come."

Original investors New Enterprise Associates, Costanoa Ventures, ArcTern Ventures, Struck Capital and Alliance Venture participated in the round as they pointed out Aquabyte's achievements since its Series A funding in 2019.

Since the funding, the company now has hundreds of systems installed worldwide monitoring salmon and trout, established offices in the US, Norway and Chile, has processed over 300 million fish images, and was the first to receive approval for automatic sea lice counting by the Norwegian Food Safety Authorities.

"Mass market appeal and the potential for positive global impact make for very exciting investment opportunities – Aquabyte has both," says Greg Papadopoulos, Venture Partner at NEA. "We're thrilled to continue partnering with the Aquabyte team to go through this next phase of growth."

With this Series B round of funding, Aquabyte has raised a total of US$46 million since its founding in 2017. It will use the financing to scale its business, to monitor more species in more countries and help fish farms sustainably feed the world.

"It turns out that when you improve fish welfare and sustainability, you solve problems in efficiency as well," concludes Mr Shang.

For more information on Aquabyte visit their website, HERE.

Taste of BC achieves developments in RAS facility

Seafood company Blue Star Foods' wholly owned subsidiary Taste of BC Aquafarms has achieved "recent developments" and "key operating performance metrics", according to the company in a recent press release. These developments are related to the land-based farm Taste of BC is currently operating where it produces steelhead trout.

In the second quarter of 2022 the company hatched its first batch of Chinook Salmon, which are currently performing well in growth trials and demonstrating good food conversion rate (FCR), growth and low mortality. The intention is to raise them to an average size of three kilograms as it evaluates potential species diversification within the Pacific Salmon family.

Over the last six months average fish harvest weight has been 1.94kg, with the target being 2kg for the steelhead salmon it produces. The total harvest downgrade, which measures number of fish at harvest that weren't brought to market at full price in the last lifecycle, was 1.3%.

Construction of the new, state-of-the-art hatchery will be done in the third quarter of this year, which gives the company an opportunity to evaluate performance of next generation designs planned for its large-scale expansion before they are finalised.

Plated steelhead trout.

"The first six months of 2022 have been focused on increasing standing biomass within our pilot facility as we continue to limit test system capabilities," explains Ben Atkinson, the President of Taste of BC. "At the end of Q2-2022, we finished with a standing biomass of 40MT in our facility … without compromising water conditions or fish performance."

"We are extremely pleased with the capabilities of our pilot system which provides a solid foundation upon which we are designing our forthcoming expansion," he concludes.

Blue Star Foods recently began operating its soft-shell crab division in February of this year, having picked HTH Engineering & Equipment as its RAS technology provider for its Atlantic crab farm in South Carolina. You can read more about that and its recent report on RAS operations, HERE.

For more information on Blue Star Foods visit their website, HERE.

Several land-based projects in the pipeline, Samherji reports

According to a financial report released by fish farmer Samherji, who is in the process of constructing a land-based fish farm in Reykjanes Peninsula in Iceland, has reported a total investment of EU€400 million into the project, among other investments.

According to Samherji's CEO Thorsteinn Már Baldvinsson, the company has 'faith' in land-based fish farming but expressed the cost of the investments.

"All development in the sector is very costly. Therefore, the company must be financially strong now as before. The consolidated financial statements show that this is the case," Mr Baldvinsson explains.

Once the land-based facility is complete, the company expects for annual production to sit around the 40,000 tonnes mark. The facility will comprise of a hatchery, breeding farm, processing plant and service buildings, all of which have had a total investment of US$340 million.

"The total investment in aquaculture is estimated at around EU€400 million," says Mr Baldvinsson. "The Board of Directors of Samherji hf. has decided to provide funding for the project's first phase in Reykjanes by increasing the share capital … up to EU€50 million."

Image credit: Samherji

Other challenges face operation of their facilities as the price of oil "skyrockets" due to the conflict in Ukraine, and is the second highest cost in fish farming next to employee wages.

"How prices will develop in the future is entirely uncertain and will be affected by many external factors," he remarks.

Also in the company's project pipeline is another land-based facility which will be built in Öxarfjördur, northeast Iceland. Samherji is a main producer of Arctic char, but the facility marks its expansion into salmon production. The site produces 1500 tonnes of salmon annually but is expected to increase to 3000 tonnes when the facility is complete.

"The site in Öxarfjördur can be considerd a 'pilot project' for the development in Reykjanes," explains Mr Baldvinsson. "Next fall, construction will begin for a new hatchery in Stadur in Grindavík. The estimated cost for the project is around EU€6.6 million."

You can read in more detail about the construction of the facilities, HERE.

For more information on Samherji visit their website, HERE.

Mørenot in the process of developing system to tackle ocean plastic

Tackling what it calls "one of the most pressing environmental problems of our age," Mørenot is currently involved in a project to develop a 2.5km-long ocean clean-up system to clear the ocean of marine plastic.

Working cooperatively with Dutch non-profit organisation The Ocean Cleanup, they developed a prototype in 2021 that proved to be highly successful and has collected large amounts of plastic in the Pacific Ocean. The Ocean Cleanup develops and scales technologies to clear the world's oceans of plastic. A new, improved version is under development in a project titled 'System 03' for which Mørenot was the chosen supplier.

Following on from the testing of System 002 in harvesting plastic, it has highlighted key areas where System 03 can improve related to overtopping – referring to when plastic rides waves and evades capture – as well as challenging conditions at sea, requiring consideration of timing extractions and choosing where to deploy the system.

According to CEO of Mørenot, Arne Birkeland, the company can lend their expertise in the aquaculture industry to the project.

"With more than a century's experience from the fisheries and aquaculture industry, it's great that we can now use our technology and know-how to help The Ocean Cleanup develop System 03, which is three times as big the previous system," he explains. "We're really enthusiastic about the project and are proud to be a part of it."

A size comparison of System 03 with System 002.

System 03 is three times the size of System 002 and has been specially designed and tailored for the purpose of cleaning up plastic. It measures four metres deep and is designed as a funnel with an opening at the bottom to ensure fish and other marine life aren't trapped when trawling for plastic.

Two offshore vessels will be pulling the net between them. The net will clean up an area the size of a football field every 15 seconds, with potential to be cleaning the equivalent of 6000 football fields a day.

In addition to being three times the size of System 002, it is also capable of capturing much larger quantities of plastic at a lower cost per kilogram on a year-round basis. Costs for The Ocean Cleanup are related to support vessels, so by expanding the size of the system to remove more plastic per vessel and employing a rotating third vessel allows for the company to drive down anticipated cost per kilogram of plastic removed.

"Around one to two million tonnes of plastic end up in the ocean each year, posing an immense threat to all marine life," adds Mr Birkeland. "As part of an industry that depends on the ocean, this project is extremely important to us, and we will always continue to challenge ourselves to do even more to protect the oceans as an important food source for future generations."

The company aims for System 03 to be in operation in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch near the end of summer this year. You can keep up with developments of the project, HERE.

For more information on Mørenot visit their website, HERE.

For more information on The Ocean Cleanup visit their website, HERE.

Image credit: The Ocean Cleanup