Area of focus: Safety and Health

Description:

Overfishing is a global issue that causes environmental and social problems. From an environment standpoint, it not only affects fish stocks around the world which are declining at an alarming rate but also represent an important source of water pollution due to massive fishing boats deployed in various locations. Those big scale exploitations then affect small scale fishermen by decreasing the amounts of fish reaching the coasts. Also, a lot of fish caught by the bigger boats are exported, leaving local population with a reduced quantity of food available.

One of the drivers of overfishing is the need for small fish used as feed (usually for bigger fish productions and livestock).  As the Fast Company’s article mentions : “NovoNutrients wants to replace that fish food with something more sustainable: microbes grown with carbon dioxide”.

The company uses carbon dioxide to feed microbes that become protein used for animal feed production. A pipe is connected to water where the gases are dissolved.

During the process, Hydrogen is also being produced thru (solar-powered) hydrolyse which helps power the installation.

Sources:

https://www.novonutrients.com/

https://www.fastcompany.com/40480856/this-startup-turns-climate-pollution-into-fish-feed

http://www.allaboutfeed.net/New-Proteins/Articles/2017/8/More-fish-meal-but-growing-interest-in-alternatives-165917E/?cmpid=NLC%7Callaboutfeed%7C2017-08-02%7CMore_fish_meal,_but_growing_interest_in_alternatives#comments

 

Stakeholders :

• Animal feed manufacturing companies
• Livestock and aquaculture farms
• Government officials

Implementation:

• Research countries with the highest concentration of aquaculture farms
• Approach farmers to show them the product
• Work with government officials to integrate the use of the product in best management practice guides for farmers

Other technology:  Fighting fire with math and maps (https://blog.nature.org/science/2016/08/03/technology-to-the-rescue-for-foresters-in-the-thick-of-it/)

This technology is interesting as it could help cities with diseases spreading among trees. By mapping the type of trees available around the city, officials would be able to better diversify the kind of new trees planted making “greening” efforts more efficient.