Objective
The proposed project is focused on supporting the 6,000 SMEs that work in the European aquaculture sector and over 50,000 SMEs in our supply chain including; plant installation, tank manufacturers, filtration engineers and temperature control engineers. European aquaculture production has increased substantially over the last decades. However, overall production growth in Europe over the period 1994-2001 was 6.3% APR, 5.5% less than the global trend. The overall price trend was negative (-0.5% APR) vs positive global development. This sector has experienced increasing competition from non-EU countries, especially Asia and South America has made it imperative to increase research and development. Land based fish farming is the critical success factor in intensive aquaculture since they are the start of a very complicated value chain. Further developments of land based fish farms are therefore crucial for the aquacultural sector. Water is one of the most critical input factors, and control of water temperature is the most important factor for optimal growth. The proposed project aims to develop technology that will allow the water in an aquaculture tank to be maintained at the optimum temperature to enhance fish growth by creating a modular constructed, thermally insulated, temperature controlled, low running cost system. The OptiTEMPtank system will be constructed from rotationally moulded segments with internal foaming to provide thermal insulation, which will be joined together with an innovative system to provide a seal against the water. A temperature control system will adjust incoming water temperature to maintain the optimum required to promote maximum growth through the use of innovative water heater and cooler fuelled by biogas. The biogas will be generated from the Biomass (aquaculture faeces and unused food waste) filtered out from the outlet of the tank through the use of an innovative micro-scale anaerobic digestion biogas generator.
Fields of science
- agricultural sciencesagriculture, forestry, and fisheriesfisheries
- engineering and technologyenvironmental biotechnologybioremediationbioreactors
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringcontrol systems
- agricultural sciencesagricultural biotechnologybiomass
Topic(s)
Call for proposal
FP7-SME-2007-1
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
BSG-SME - Research for SMEsCoordinator
WREXHAM
United Kingdom