Potentials for Wild Cyanobacteria Harvest - A Case Study of Baltic Sea and Blooms of Nodularia sp.
Background
It all began with a discussion on eutrophication problems in the Baltic Sea and how there are annual summer cyanobacterial blooms. Solutions were proposed, flows of catchment are discussed. Regardless of how much environmental measures are taken, nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea will still exist. Therefore one question remains, as crazy as it may sound, can we directly harvest the cyanobacteria bloom. A study by Gröndahl (2009) shows potential method to harvest wild cyanobacteria biomass during summer blooms in the Baltic Sea. However, little is known about the annual biomass harvest, scale, and consistency potential for harvest. This study therefore conducted a preliminary study on the potentials for wild cyanobacteria harvest in the Baltic Sea, using data from monitoring stations shown on the map.
Reference:
Gröndahl, F., 2009. Removal of surface blooms of the cyanobacteria Nodularia spumigena: a pilot project conducted in the Baltic Sea. AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment, 38(2), pp.79-84.
Findings
Blooms were found to be very sporadic. A study of the satellite data provided by the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) from 2003 - 2009 shows a lack of consistency in bloom sizes, occurrences, and longevity. The graph on the right, taken from Pechsiri (2019), shows the sporadic nature of these cyanobacteria blooms. The graph represents the number of days where Nodularia spumigena bloom for different years at different locations in the Baltic Sea. Regardless of years, the one location that persistently has Nodularia sp. blooms is the Gotland basin. Harvest of such biomass has potential to yield substantial potential quantities of nutrient recovery (Pechsiri 2014). See published material for more details.
Reference
Pechsiri, J., 2019. Nutrient Recovery as an Added Benefit to Harvests of Photosynthetic Marine Biomass: A Holistic Systems Perspective on Harvesting Marine Microalgae, Cyanobacteria, and Macroalgae (Doctoral dissertation, KTH Royal Institute of Technology).