Norwegian Seaweed Association (NSA) Cluster Insights Report - Technical and Operational: Deliverable 2.2 (Due M18)

Published 20.06.2025

Summary

This report describes the technical aspects of seaweed farming currently in operation, drawn from
sample companies in the Norwegian Seaweed Associated (NSA) cluster, and how they relate to
regenerative ocean farming. In addition to an extensive literature review, we compiled information
from more detailed NSA case studies and one international (within Europe) case study for
comparison. This report presents the results of these case study interviews and summarises the
key findings, which augments the information previously outlined in D2.1, and applies the
definitions of regenerative aquaculture as stated in D1.1 (following Mizuta et al. 2023).
To reiterate and highlight, the goals of Workpackage 2 on the C-FAARER project were to: 1)
discuss the feasibility of site-specific regenerative ocean farming (exploring aspects of farming
infrastructure, methodologies, technologies and associated operating standards); 2) highlight the
social and economic viability, as well as relevance for local communities of regenerative
aquaculture; and 3) identify key challenges and barriers in the policy and regulatory domains (EU,
national and local).
This report aims to complement the topics covered extensively in D2.1, including the key
messages that were derived about the feasibility of community-driven regenerative ocean farming
- exploring elements of farming operations, business and regulatory domains, and environmental
aspects, and the insights that were established from preliminary interviews with NSA member
companies. This report will further develop these topics by focusing on presenting an overview of
case study material from follow-up interviews with selected seaweed cultivation companies, on
exploring opportunities for developing regenerative aquaculture in Europe, and the potential
pathways to optimise seaweed farming operations towards regenerative principles.