European Commission launched a study (EMFF/EMFAF WP 2020 action 3.1.16 implementation, "Algae & Climate") to provide sound and up-to-date knowledge on the potential impacts of scaling up the production of marine algae through aquaculture in the EU and its impacts. The main questions the study addressed include:
- What are the biomass and nutritional yields algae can provide, depending on the types of algae and the production technologies applied in marine waters and inland?
- What are the costs and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of different types of algae production technologies? How do they compare with the costs and GHG emissions of land-based crops (e.g. soya) with similar nutritional properties?
- Under which conditions would algae production (in particular inland systems fed by flue gases or wastewater nutrients) be competitive?
- What could be the potential total algae biomass production amount in Europe, as well as the resulting carbon dioxide captured (seaweed cultivation) and input (in microalgae cultivation - nutrients, freshwater and land) in particular uses? Which share of (today and future) animal and fish feed requirements could be met by algae production? What are the main constraints (e.g. low production volumes, high production costs, etc) on increasing the proportion of algae in recognized animal feed.
We are glad to inform you that the final study report has been published on the:
- EU Bookshop publications website: https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/0b532125-2241-11ee-94cb-01aa75ed71a1/language-en/format-PDF/source-289898425
- DG MARE website: https://oceans-and-fisheries.ec.europa.eu/publications-list_en
- Interinstitutional Database of EU Studies: StudiesDB (testa.eu)