Open letter: AquaMaof VP responds to Atlantic Sapphire co-founder on land-based salmon viability
Following SalmonBusiness’ recent article featuring Atlantic Sapphire co-founder Johan Andreassen’s comments on the challenges facing land-based salmon farming in the US, AquaMaof Vice President Yoav Dagan has written an open letter responding directly to the claims:
Dear Johan,
US Salmon Production Opportunities in RAS are Huge.
The US salmon production industry will not be developed using slightly flawed RAS technology for market fish production combined with less than optimum management protocols. We have developed RAS technology that has been used in multiple countries showing good results for commercial salmon production. Technology has demonstrated capabilities for feeding and water treatment capacity greater than the design capacity, thereby any annual production less than design capacity is related to the use of less than optimum fish management protocols (an extremely important factor for viable facility operation).
We have operated our R&D facility with more than 40 cohorts of Atlantic salmon, both triploid and diploid fish. Optimum management protocols will produce Atlantic salmon post smolts at >200 grams in 8 months, >1000 grams in 12 months and market fish in >20 months from start of feeding. Key factors in management protocols include incubation protocol, constant water quality, adjusted water chemistry, smoltification protocol, optimum feed quality (based on fish testing), optimum light regimes and water temperature. Early maturation and off-flavor can be managed. Finally, with customized and proven denitrification system, water use can be significantly reduced using our DNS as in our designs for facilities in Canada and Japan. The DNS treats wastewater from fish production and returns this water to the fish production RAS.
Many factors will influence CAPEX, such as site location and the number of engineering mistakes. The CAPEX should be in the range of $20 to $25 per kg of annual production. And the OPEX between $3.5–$5 per kg.
Well-designed RAS of larger scale than 5,000 tons can have a low cost of production and compete with costs of net-pen salmon production and the RAS will not require air transportation from the farm to the market.
The US has aquaculture permitted and permittable locations for large aquaculture facilities and in some locations very low electric energy costs. And our RAS technology can be operated with freshwater for the full life cycle, significantly increasing the potential aquaculture sites. Cooling water for Atlantic salmon production in RAS is critical and we have identified cost efficiencies for complete RAS technology and defined cooling requirements that enable optimum fish production.
Yoav Dagan