Harvesting of Nodularia spumigena in the Baltic Sea: Assessment of Potentials and Added Benefits

Assessing energy return on investment for harvest of wild Nodularia spumigena during blooms in the Baltic Sea

“…Data underlying this figure is available in the Supporting Information cyanobacteria blooms between 2013-2020. Similarly to the literature (e.g., Pechsiri et al, 2014), the nature of cyanobacteria blooms are highly sporadic, but occurs in all summers during 2013-2020.…”

“…The removal of the biomass not only avoided the exposure to nodularin toxins prominent in N. spumigena (Lehtimaki et al, 1997) but was also found to have additional environmental benefits. Potentials for recovery of nitrogen and phosphorus as fertilizer through the conversion of cyanobacteria biomass into biogas were also found to be substantial in the literature (Pechsiri et al, 2014;Buchmann, 2016). However, as pointed out by Pechsiri et al (2014), additional environmental and economic assessments for methods of wild cyanobacteria harvests during summer blooms are needed, which remain to be a main research gap in the literature and therefore motivates this study.…”

“…Biological and hydrological data for the Gotland basin was therefore obtained from monitoring stations "SOOP-SQ0011" and "BY15" (SMHIa, 2020; also see Figure 1), which was accessible through the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) and The Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission (Helsinki Commission-HELCOM). Estimation for the biomass concentration in the water column during a cyanobacteria blooming event follows the approach conducted in Pechsiri et al (2014) as follows:…”

“…Operations exceeding this speed will result in less effective harvest. Concerns exist in the effectiveness of oilbooms when wave heights are > 1 m (USEPA, 1999), but F I G U R E 2 Systems overview for the harvest of cyanobacteria biomass during summer bloom episodes in the Baltic Sea, and the downstream conversion of biomass into biogas and biofertilizer during blooms, wave heights were < 1 m (Pechsiri et al, 2014). The boat considered in this study follows a commercial sea-worthy tugboat with attached barge and crane (personal communication with Jenkins Marine).…”

“…Cyanobacteria , and the intracellular N and P were determined following C:N:P of 208:58:1, where on average C, N, and P constitute 43%, 8%, and 0.6% of N. spumigena dry weight, respectively (Walve & Larsson, 2010). Due to the sporadic nature of blooms, as observed in Pechsiri et al (2014), a minimum and maximum biomass concentration potential was considered.…”