Go ahead for new fish farm designs

NORWAY’S Fisheries Directorate has given conditional support to two experimental fish farm designs.

First unveiled last year, a joint concept by Norway Royal Salmon and Aker ASA won preliminary backing, as did Marine Harvest’s ‘Donut’ proposal, but it has ruled that in both cases additional information must be provided.

Norway Royal Salmon and Aker said their submersible offshore cages project included a high degree of innovation and investment.

Marine Harvest said the approval had the potential to take aquaculture in Norway forward. The regulator said the applications to build the designs that won backing will now go to the next stage in the approval process.

However, the Fisheries Directorate said it had rejected three proposals, including Marine Harvest’s ‘Beck cage’ concept as well as two designs proposed by Eide Fhordbruk and Norsk Marin Fisk/Stjernefarm.

The Directorate of Fisheries awards permits to operators who develop technology and solutions that can solve challenges in the aquaculture industry.

Together, Norway Royal Salmon ASA (NRS) and Aker ASA (Aker) say they have developed a new offshore farming concept that facilitates sustainable growth in areas that the technology thus far has not been able to exploit

‘NRS and Aker have an industrial ambition to combine knowledge from the aquaculture industry with offshore competence,’ said CEO Charles Høstlund of Norway Royal Salmon and CEO Øyvind Eriksen of Aker.

They added that the consent would allow them to develop the aquaculture farms of the future. By placing the farms further away from the coast, the concept increases the area utilisation of Norwegian waters.