Refurbished feed barges offer concrete benefits for Mowi
Upcycled Sea-Caps are now less obtrusive and quieter ... and £4m cheaper than new-builds
Salmon farmer Mowi Scotland has delivered the first of five fully refurbished Sea-Cap feed barges to Loch Etive as part of a consolidation project to reduce from four farms to three, while ensuring that all operations and the visual appearance of the sites meets high standards.
Three barges will be used in Loch Etive and will be operated remotely from the shore base, reducing marine traffic on the loch and vessel emissions, while two barges will be available for Mowi’s operations in Ireland.
Mowi said the upcycling of redundant concrete barge hulls into lower profile, energy-efficient hybrid barges will provide sustainability benefits and cost savings of approximately £4 million relative to purchasing new feed barges.
Tidier sites
The salmon farmer acquired the sites at Loch Etive when it bought trout farmer Dawnfresh in 2022 and will use them to raise large salmon post-smolts for its high-energy sites.
Clara McGhee, who was until recently area manager for Dawnfresh before moving to Mowi Ireland, said a consultation to gauge the views of the communities surrounding Loch Etive showed residents were largely supportive of the changes to lower profile equipment and hybrid battery barges.
“Some fairly stated that farming operations could be tidier, so this shift is an important step to reduce the impact on the surrounding area,” added McGhee.
Sound proofing
Dougie Gibson, a specialist in vessel and barge engineering, said: “The refurbishment and re-use of these redundant barges is a great use of resources with a positive outcome for the environment. All five barges have been fitted with sound proofing and designed to lessen the height and visual profile, reducing emissions and noise.”
Mowi Scotland worked with Scottish aquaculture industry supplier Gael Force Group to repurpose the barges.
“Working constructively together with the multi-disciplined Gael Force team at its facility in Inverness has delivered this successful project outcome for Mowi,” said Gibson. “Not only does this project represent an excellent example of the industry benefits from upcycling aquaculture assets, but also demonstrates to the wider aquaculture sector the breadth and depth of technical engineering competence which exists within Scotland.”
Gael Force managing director Stewart Graham said: “We were challenged some years ago with how we may deal with end-of-life small concrete barges; whether to fully dismantle, decommission, or re-purpose, and we came up with the lowest impact idea to upcycle the Sea-Cap feed barges to unmanned low profile feeding units.
“With the advances in technology and barges now being able to be remotely operated from feed control centres, it became clear that there was a potential large sustainability and economic upside to upcycling the barges. We reconfigured the designs, removing the superstructure and thereby lowering the profile and the visual impact, and fitted new up-to-date Gael Force SeaFeed systems and hybrid power solutions."
Energy savings
Gael Force uses hybrid power systems supplied by Norwegian company Fjord Maritime, which appointed a new branch manager for the UK earlier this year.
“All design and upgrade works were carried out at our quayside location in Inverness. It is a superb example of low environmental impact and low-cost repurposing of an existing asset which, due to the hybrid system fitted, will now also run with very significant energy savings, too," said Graham.
“We congratulate Mowi for its vision and commitment to this ongoing upcycling project.”
A hybrid power system uses spare power produced by a diesel generator to charge a battery bank. That stored power can then be used to run some systems on the barge, reducing the time that the generator is required to operate and lessening noise, fuel consumption, and greenhouse gas emissions.
