The California Coastal Commission has approved a consistency certification for Ocean Rainforest’s proposed 2,000-acre commercial kelp farm to be built in the Santa Barbara Channel.
According to the Goleta, California, U.S.A.-based aquaculture company, the certification was the final major regulatory hurdle it needed before beginning construction.
“This approval is a major milestone for Ocean Rainforest and gives us the foundation to take offshore kelp cultivation in California from demonstration to commercial scale,” Ocean Rainforest CEO Olavur Gregersen said in a release. “But, the permit alone is not enough. Our success will depend on building a viable value chain where cultivation grows alongside market demand for sustainable seaweed products that can contribute to a better life for people and the planet.”
Ocean Rainforest is a vertically integrated company harvesting seaweed and developing commercial seaweed products, with operations in the Faroe Islands; California; and Baja California, Mexico.
The company’s latest project is a 2,000-acre farm located 4 miles off the coast of Ventura County that will cultivate native giant kelp. The project is expected to produce 6,000 wet tons of kelp every year, which will be landed in Ventura Harbor and used for agricultural applications.
Ocean Rainforest plans to grow the kelp using a submerged cultivation system specifically designed for open-ocean conditions. The company previously tested the technology with an 86-acre demonstration farm off the coast of Santa Barbara.
“The demonstration farm gave us invaluable real-world experience in cultivating giant kelp in an open-ocean environment. We learned not only how to improve the cultivation system itself but also how to operate, monitor, and maintain an offshore farm responsibly under real conditions. Those lessons have directly shaped the design for the Ventura project and give us a much stronger foundation for moving toward commercial-scale cultivation,” Ocean Rainforest Director of California Operations Douglas Bush said in a release.
The project now has a valid permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as well as support from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E). The department runs the MARINER program, which supports the development of large-scale marine biomass cultivation.
“Building a commercial market for cultivated kelp also means demonstrating that seaweed farming can be developed responsibly alongside existing ocean uses,” Ocean Rainforest Regulatory and Engagement Lead Kaira Wallace said in a release. “Throughout this process, we have worked closely with regulators, fishermen, researchers, and local stakeholders to listen, learn, and improve the project. That engagement has directly influenced how the farm is designed, operated, and monitored, and it will remain an important part of how we approach development going forward.”
