Michel Jullian wrote:
Hi Thomas,
Welcome to the Sargasso Sea Farming club! Let's see if I understand your concept
correctly, it would be a stationary sargassum farm, which would be tended to, and whose
perimeter would be defined by, vertical wind turbine powered, dynamically moored,
"factory ships", right? Any fencing, floating nets maybe?
What kind of growing surface area would this be? Also, what fuel would you
convert the weeds to?
How advanced is this business plan you mention?
Michel
Michel Jullian wrote:
Indeed Vorts we can do better than this: zero ship time!
We already found how to seed/fertilize directly from land (e.g. from the
Azores, cf quoted post below).
But _even harvesting_ could be done without any ship: we could install a fixed
harvesting robot, or cluster of harvesting robots, at the Eye (where the crop
converges automagically by vortical effect, remember?), connected to an
underwater Sea Line (not necessarily resting on the deep ocean bottom: with an
ad hoc anchoring scheme it could be arranged to float in midwater say at 100m
depth to save on total length) which would convey the harvest, whether raw or
pre-processed of fully processed to biofuel, to the nearest land (e.g. Bermuda)
Before I do anything else, I'm going to consult with an attorney
specializing in maritime law. I don't know that the ships would have to
be anchored in position. With GPS they could hold their position. I've
been told that if you pump deep ocean water to the top it's nutrients
stimulate plant growth, so perhaps several pump ships could raise and
disperse it. If the flow of ocean water is predictable, then perhaps the
harvesters could be positioned several; days drift, down the flow from
them. I envision a processing ship with the refinery and storage tanks.
There would be several harvesters gathering and dewatering the seaweed.
Each harvester would be serviced by wagon ships which haul the compacted
seaweed in for processing. It's a big ocean, and as long as we stay out
of shipping lanes, perhaps this can be done. There's some academics in
Scotland who have been studying the subject, now if I can just get them
to return my email.
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