Upcoming milestone for China’s first open ocean offshore fish farm.
In 2018 China’s first deep-sea fish farming facility “Deep Blue 1”, was successfully launched by Wuchang Shipbuilding Industry Group. The tower is 35 meters high, as tall as a 11-story building.
The Chinese publication Bandao reports that nearly 200,000 salmon in “Deep Blue No. 1’s” cages will “be served on citizens’ tables”, ie. harvested and processed in May.
The site is 120 nautical miles away from Dongjiakou Port, in an area called the Qingdao National Deep Sea Green Aquaculture Experimental Zone. The project is a collaboration between the company Rizhao Wanzefeng Fishery and China Ocean University.
Its successor “Deep Blue 2” has plans to have its main structure completed by the end of this year. It is three times larger than “Deep Blue 1”, and can hold up to 420,000 salmon.
Additional information in the publication mentioned that in addition to the cages, the pilot area is also refitting a wellboat.
Bandao wrote that a work vessel, with a displacement of 3,500 tonnes, has entered the stage of substantial modification for open ocean aquaculture services is expected to be completed by the end of April. When completed, it will have a marine crane, processing production line and seawater slurry system onboard.
In 2019, 200,000 salmon (2kg) were removed for repairs. At the time, the salmon farm was taken back into maintenance so that its owners could learn more from the production process, the head of the planning department of Rizhao Wanzefeng Fishery, Dong Wei told SalmonBusiness.
In February, SalmonBusiness reported that Salmar is not only considering just Norway with its serial production of ocean rigs, but also on both the east and west coasts of the United States.
