Incoming EU policies could cause the European Union to harvest more wood, shift one-fifth of cropland to bioenergy and outsource deforestation. Can we make up for this with food from the ocean? The European Commission’s high level group of scientific advisers concluded that the most efficient way of doing this was through non-fed aquaculture – primarily shellfish or algae. Initial estimates determined that provided sufficient space is needed between farms, the production of 10Mt of seaweed or shellfish would have only a marginal effect on regional nutrient budgets: so impacts on ecosystems would be minimal. The analysis is presented here.