Abstract
As the fight against climate change has accelerated in recent years, the desire to find innovative technologies has been a focus to mitigate the impacts. Regenerative ocean farming (ROF), a hybrid and more rigorous form of seaweed farming has gained attention as a tool to combat climate change and decrease greenhouse gas emissions. Regenerative ocean farming focuses on creating lattice structures in oceans to grow shellfish, seaweed, and kelp. Mimicking natural reefs and other aquatic ecosystems, it generates a net-positive system that consists of using no inputs and has the potential to fight climate change (“Regenerative ocean farming: GreenWave”). These farms pose benefits such as soaking up fertilizer run-off and sequestering carbon (“Regenerative ocean farming: GreenWave”). While regenerative ocean farms have many perceived benefits, there has been a lack of research and financial investment in supporting their creation (Lieb). Due to the urgency of reaching 2030 global climate goals, foremost minimizing the temperature increase to below 2℃, but preferably 1.5℃, the scaling up of regenerative ocean cultivation is crucial. Governing and organizational bodies such as the United Nations, European Union, and the United States, as well as corporate entities, must ramp up their support for climate change mitigating activities. Their decisions to accelerate research and secure more significant public and private funding for regenerative ocean farming can generate exponential climate change mitigation benefits by 2030.
Origins and Current Institutions Dedicated to ROF
The East and Southeast Asian seaweed cultivation industry is well developed, with seaweed being a staple in the diet of inhabitants in those regions for over a thousand years (Hwang et al. 490). During the late 1940s, the cultivation of kelp in near-shore regions began, with the modern seaweed industry in Korea, Japan, and China growing between the 1950s and 1970s (Hwang et al. 490). In 2019, Asia accounted for 97.38% of seaweed production worldwide, with China farming almost 20.3 million tons of seaweed and Indonesia almost 10 million tons (Cai). The Asian seaweed production creates a food source for the inhabitants of the continent, as well as a global consumer export asset.
In the past decade, organizations have been established in the United States and European Union to create such farms to combat climate change. While the intentions behind the Asian farms and the current expanding industries in the West have differed, they function in a similar capacity. For the purposes of this proposal, the focus is on GreenWave, originating in the Northeast of the United States, and Havhøst, from Denmark. They were established in 2012 and 2015, respectively, to support the expansion of the regenerative ocean farming industries in their respective countries (“Our Story”; “Purpose”). GreenWave, a nonprofit organization, focuses on supporting and training ocean farmers across the United States, with their reefs currently being developed in the Northeast, West Coast, and Alaskan regions of the United States (“Our Approach”). Havhøst, “an association of maritime utility gardens, NGOs, schools, businesses and quite ordinary people,” focuses on harvesting regenerative crops to achieve a more sustainable environment and support the oceans through a network of people passionate about supporting them (“We are Sea Harvest”).While Asia remains the largest producer of seaweed cultivation, nonprofit organizations geared toward promoting ocean cultivation for climate change mitigation have been expanding in recent years. In the United States, seaweed farming has been the “fastest-growing aquaculture sector,” for example, in Alaska there was a “200 percent increase over the state’s first commercial harvest in 2017” (“Seaweed Aquaculture”).
ROF Benefits
Regenerative ocean farming produces a multitude of benefits, many of which are vital in mitigating climate change impacts. Foremost among them are carbon sequestration and nitrogen capture, ecosystem restoration, human-focused job creation, and food security.
Seaweed cultivation, known for its ability to capture carbon, makes it a great source for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. On average, ‘one square kilometer of seaweed can sequester more than a thousand metric tons’ of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (Smith). Additionally, ocean cultivation can be used to create sustainable fertilizers made of seaweed (“Ocean Farming: Producing Sea Crops and Creating Healthy Ecosystems”), but also capture the excess nitrogen and phosphorus, mainly coming from fertilizers, during storm run-offs (“Seaweed Aquaculture”). Collectively, the world is emitting roughly 50 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year, making offsets and carbon capture systems more necessary than ever (Ritchie et al.). Investing in the scaling up of regenerative aquaculture is a necessity. Researchers predict that “farming in 3.8% of federal waters off the California coast” could “neutralize… the state’s $50 billion agriculture industry” (Woody). With the agriculture industry reflecting 11% of total greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 in the United States and California’s agriculture industry accounting for 13% of cash crops, investing in regenerative aquaculture would have the ability to offset a large portion of emissions from this sector (“Sources of Greenhouse Gas Emissions; Snibbe). Seaweed cultivation’s ability to capture CO2 and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) from fertilizer run-off is a compelling reason to invest in the infrastructure needed for this industry.
Regenerative ocean farming also encourages ecosystem restoration. Ocean acidification, which has increased by 30% in the past roughly 200 years, due to increasing levels of greenhouse gases that the ocean captures, has led to biodiversity loss (“Ocean acidification”). Habitats and species have been destroyed by the increasing levels of GHGs that oceans have been required to capture. Aquaculture cultivation has the ability to offset some of these impacts. For example, seaweed cultivation has the ability to improve water quality and reduce acidity, so shellfish have the ability to maintain their shells which are damaged by low pH levels (Goldstone and Partan).
Regenerative ocean farming also has great social benefit potential. Its development creates jobs and a reliable food source. Scaling up of “farming seaweed in 0.1% of… oceans could create 50 million direct jobs, and a further 100 million associated jobs” (“Regenerative ocean farming: GreenWave”).” Additionally, “if seaweed production increased by 14% each year, the global food supply would boost by 500 million tons by 2050 (Bjerregaard et al.).”
The United Nations, United States, and European Union
The major challenges this industry faces are a lack of funding, research, and infrastructure. The United Nations, United States, and European Union must step up to support regenerative ocean farming. Their decisions to do so can make a meaningful difference.
One of the major goals of the United Nations Climate Change Conference of 2021, known as COP26, was adaptation. Adaptation, in this case, included the protection of lands and water through sustainable farming, protection of natural habitats, and the creation of “resilient infrastructure” (“Adaptation”). This explicit declaration at the end of COP 26 demonstrates advocacy for healthy ocean habitats and sustainable farming, which regenerative aquaculture accomplishes, hence, the United Nations must support these farms immediately to meet its own goals.
In the United States, the Department of Agriculture scientists carry out research on aquaculture innovation and how to maintain healthy ecosystems (“Aquaculture”). 31% of farmers received subsidies in the past 27 years, mainly in the land crop sector (“The United States Farm Subsidy Information”). Combining USDA’s efforts and subsidies with additional advisory by non-profit organizations such as GreenWave would enable the scaling up of these farms. GreenWave has created a program called the Seaweed Source, a database that matches ocean farmers in New England with buyers to streamline revenue in a way that allows farmers to continue their activities. For the 2022 season alone, ‘300,000 pounds of kelp’ has already been ordered (“Seaweed Source”). A tool such as this one creates an efficient system for farmers and buyers to work together and keep the local regenerative ocean farming community growing financially. If the Department of Agriculture worked with GreenWave to expand this system across the United States, there would most definitely be an increase in sales, which would be an incentive for more people to become regenerative ocean farmers, especially if other incentives such as tax subsidies were applied. The United States must invest in regenerative aquaculture as a way to mitigate the large climate change impacts the nation has produced.
Prospects for the European Union include utilizing the Aquaculture Advisory Council, the commitments made by the European Green Deal, and expanding current plans to create seaweed farms. Currently, “North Sea Farmers aims to grow its seaweed production to 400km of seaweed production by 2030” (Farmer). This plan requires an increase of seaweed in the diet of European citizens, as well as its ability to be used as feedstock and bio-plastics (Farmer). It is one the European Union must support, financially and through policy. The European Commission has plans to launch an algae stakeholder platform in the summer of 2022, similar to that of Seaweed Source by GreenWave (“European Commission launches platform to promote production and use of algae in Europe”). The aim of the platform is to “accelerate the development of a European algae industry” by connecting “algae farmers, producers, sellers, consumers, technology developers as well as business-support organizations, investors, public authorities, academia, researchers and NGOs” (“European Commission launches platform to promote production and use of algae in Europe”). Implementing and promoting such a platform, called EU4Algae, that synthesizes private sector firms with public institutions is a great example for scaling up this industry. Platforms such as this one must be implemented and well-shared to accelerate the spread of regenerative ocean farming in Europe.
The UN, the United States, and the EU must do their part to mitigate climate change by 2030. Investing in regenerative ocean farming would reap many benefits for them. Regenerative ocean farming’s climate-positive nature, ability to soak up greenhouse gases, and promote biodiversity make it a system that must be scaled up rapidly within the next few years and promoted on a global scale to mitigate climate change impacts effectively.
Works Cited
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