Open Ocean Growth
Over the course of multiple experiments, we observed increases of macroalgae coverage on cotton hanks seeded with macroalgae and deployed in the open ocean. This marked, to our knowledge, the first time Ulva fenestrata or Ulva lactuca has been proven to successfully grow in the open ocean. These successful research deployments established a baseline performance of our macroalgae product (macroalgae + substrate + operational logistics) in a given oceanic location over time, setting an important starting point in an iterative, multi-year product development cycle and uncovering opportunities for improvement in our system design. Data that was collected included daily images, GPS coordinates and ocean temperature.
Open ocean growth experiments
Between June and September 2023, Running Tide conducted five open ocean growth experiment deployments. The deployments represented a significant cross-functional effort with the Open Ocean Growth Experiment (OOGE) project team composed of personnel from all over the company. The main goal of the OOGE was to establish the logistics required to run a macroalgae research deployment, meaning, move from the compartmentalized research of our individual teams (Ocean Modeling, Macroalgae, Hardware Engineering, Logistics, Operations, and Communications) to a demonstration of how our combined work comes together in a complete system. The following top-line questions were addressed by the five deployments:
Can we grow Ulva in the open ocean?
Will it grow from pre-seeded material?
Will it grow as established, mature material?
Is there a difference between North American and Icelandic Ulva growth?
Can we consistently and reliably sporulate and seed Ulva on a deployment schedule?
Can this be done in Portland, Maine?
Can this be done in Akranes, Iceland?
Can we build a vessel that safely transports macroalgae during their voyage to the deployment site?
Can we accurately deploy at our model selected deployment locations?
What improvements can we make to our imaging hardware/software and subsequent analyses?
While a lot of information was collected from the deployments in 2023, and can be found in our Macroalgae Deployment Report 2023, the key scientific result was the successful demonstration of visual Ulva growth, marking the first time Running Tide captured open ocean macroalgal growth on camera. Additional operational insights to the deployments can be found in our OOGE Operational Retrospective.
In 2024, a single OOGE deployment was conducted in May, this time focusing on Saccharina latissima instead of Ulva. Because the life cycles and physiologies of the two species are so different, the same questions mentioned above had to be answered for S. latissima. Additionally, the teams spent the year improving the models, software, hardware, and logistics utilized in the deployment and, therefore, their same questions were addressed to assist in further refinements.
The team loaded samples into sensor buoys with serial numbers CB3.21 and CB3.22 to capture visual and environmental data. During the month following the deployment, we observed macroalgal growth from the camera buoys; however, we were unable to confirm sugar kelp blade growth before the closing of Running Tide and cessation of the visual data collection.
Using our camera buoys, we were able to confirm growth visually on the samples in their first 30 days in the open ocean.
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