Odlin told MIT Technology Review last year: “If we can unleash growth in the open ocean, which we think is possible, then it has the potential to scale up quite a bit.
But sources say initial efforts to grow further ashore have not produced much kelp.
Odlin said in an email, Running Tide’s remote imaging system showed that young sugar kelp planted on wire had grown in the ocean, Odlin said in an email, adding that this was not achieved. before.
“The output and consistency are still not commensurate with the need for large-scale carbon removal,” he said. But he said the company isn’t expecting that yet, and some of the initial efforts have been mainly focused on testing the company’s engineering systems and implementation methods.
He and Justin Ries, senior scientific advisors at Running Tide, added that scientists already knew kelp would grow in the open ocean, because there are varieties that do. They said the company will continue to test on a small pilot scale until optimal species, locations and conditions are identified.
“No one is saying this will be easy, noting that they are working with complex biological systems and many macroalgae species,” says Odlin. “Some will work really well; some are not; some will have huge variance… that’s part of a system optimization that takes years. ”
“It could take 30, 40 rollouts to start gaining traction and doing just that,” he said, adding that the company is still “a long way” from any “big growth.” What is important?”
Start
According to LinkedIn, employees who have left in recent months include Margaux Filippi, director of ocean science; Raj Saha, senior data scientist; Olivia Alcabes, data scientist; Jean Bertrand Contina, agronomist on macroalgae production; and Maxwell Calloway, senior kelp biologist. They either did not respond to questions or declined to comment for this section.
Most of the researchers left after less than a year at the company and a few after just six months, according to the career website.
