Simply Blue Group and Arctic Seaweed to explore co-locating seaweed among offshore wind farms

Simply Blue Group and Arctic Seaweed have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which will see them exploring solutions for co-locating seaweed farms among offshore wind farms.

Headquartered in Cork, Ireland, Simply Blue Group is a leading blue economy developer with a focus on developing offshore renewable energy projects, energy parks, and low impact aquaculture projects, including seaweed farms.

With farms installed around Bergen, Ålesund and Greenland, Arctic Seaweed is a Norwegian seaweed farming company, which has developed a unique farming method that enables cost efficient and sustainable cultivation and harvesting of seaweed with minimal impact on the environment.

Seaweed has recently started to gather interest in Europe as a crop that could replace resource intensive products like meat, plastic, fossil fuels or conventional fertilisers. Seaweed only needs nutrients from the ocean as well as sunlight to grow, with no need for fertilizer or fresh water.

Simply Blue Group is looking to develop prototype seaweed farms, as a precursor to exploring larger scale solutions within offshore wind farms. This will require seeding and harvesting processes scaled to levels that allow for time critical and safe operations offshore.

The partnership will unlock technology from Arctic Seaweed which offers a state-of-the-art production line from direct seeding to harvesting and processing, which can be installed on offshore support vessels currently used within windfarms.

Sam Roch Perks, Simply Blue Group Co-Founder and Group CEO said: “At Simply Blue Group we are committed to working with the oceans to help tackle climate change and we believe large scale seaweed farming has an important role to play. In Europe, seaweed farming has not been developed to its full potential, due to the small scale of the enterprises, the limited number of seaweed species and traditional growing techniques however we recognise the potential for strong growth in seaweed production. We’re delighted to partner with Arctic Seaweed to help progress this opportunity.”

Kim Kristensen CEO of Arctic Seaweed AS said: “From the start, Arctic Seaweed has focused on building a technology platform with the aim to industrialize seaweed cultivation, both from a hardware and an operational perspective. This strategy enables us to cater specifically for offshore wind and seaweed farm integration in various locations around the world. With Simply Blue Group, we have found an excellent partner to explore the necessary steps into combining these promising technologies for a more sustainable future.

We are very happy to have signed an MOU with SBG and are looking forward to collaborating closely with them on this specific project and hopefully on multiple future developments.”