Developing and Improving Commercial Marine Algal Culture in the United States

Maine Fresh Sea Farms (MFSF) will build a multi-species, multi-season prototype farm with the goal of having crops of fresh sea vegetables available throughout the year. What isn’t utilized fresh will be dried for longer-term storage and used in other products. Our team will gather data on water quality, nutrients, light levels, and hydrodynamics to assemble profiles of key parameters that determine optimum algal growth and evaluate factors that will be important for growing high quality sea vegetables. In addition to moving forward on the science of sea farming, we will build the necessary technology and expertise in handling, processing, and marketing to assure a clear path to commercialization. MFSF will continue our emphasis on sales of fresh sea vegetable to local and regional markets and more fully research these markets to identify all possible buyers and users. The results of this work will be requisite for the establishment of other farms.