Objective
Europe is currently facing a huge and complex challenge when it comes to cleaning its oceans. On one hand, marine litter represents a tremendous environmental problem. Plastics pose a serious threat to all marine animals, as well as to boats and coasts. There are more than 150 million tonnes of plastics accumulated in the world's oceans while up to 8 million tons are added every year. On the other, eutrophication is causing an intensification of harmful algal bloom episodes, which lead to fish die-offs, cities cutting off water to residents, or states having to close fisheries. In the EU the annual cost of those blooms surpasses the €900 million. Municipalities and public authorities in charge of the preservation of the coasts still fail at targeting these issues at the same time because current solutions consist of either simple barges that collect debris in shallow waters or boats that can harvest the undesirable algae but unable to remove litter. Asco Harvester is an Icelandic SME committed to the development of a new family of efficient and sustainable boats that can tackle these two problems thanks to their dual functionality. Our boats can mow toxic algae and clean garbage and other waste from seas and ocean waters simultaneously. ASCO boats exhibit a very high harvesting productivity (40% higher than current harvesters) and are capable of working in difficult areas, such as fjords, open oceans or river canal. In addition, they incorporate a very efficient module able to capture up to 15 tons/day of plastic and other marine litter. We have implemented a business model based in selling and renting our boats to respond to seasonal demands thus maximising our business opportunity. By the end of 2024 (five years after market launch), we expect to have 70 units in the market: 38 units sold and 32 rented, with an associated cumulative profit of €11.2 M.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
310 REYKJAVIK
Iceland
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.