Initiatives to unite aquaculture and offshore wind farms are popping up globally but they face technical, cost and environmental challenges
In July, Chinese firm Mingyang Smart Energy announced the completion of a wind turbine foundation containing a net cage for fish farming. The structure also comes with remote functions such as automated feeding, monitoring, detection and harvesting, and is due to be installed off Guangdong province. Annual production is estimated at around 75 tons of fish.
This announcement is the latest in a series of initiatives to bring together aquaculture and offshore wind farms. North Sea Farmers, a Dutch foundation that is working to develop and strengthen the seaweed industry, is aiming to establish a large-scale seaweed cultivation system within wind farms in the Dutch North Sea.
Also in the Netherlands, engineering firm OOS International is building a semi-submersible mussel farm for deployment around offshore wind sites. Elsewhere, the OLAMUR and ULTFARMS projects in Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark aim to integrate either kelp, oyster or mussel production with renewable wind energy in the North and Baltic Seas…
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