UPCOMING EVENTS
Blue + Green Webinar Series (AltaSea)
The Blue + Green 2022 webinar series will include 4 one-hour webinars scheduled Thursdays from June 2, 2022 – June 23, 2022 at 4 pm. The goal of the project is to shine a spotlight on emerging aquaculture sector in our economy. Aquaculture and the supporting technologies bring together all the key ingredients – future growth opportunities that support our coastal ecosystems, the economy, jobs, and our communities. This webinar series reimagines partnerships between business, government, universities, and communities through regenerative ocean research, exploration, and equity-based economic development.
Click here for more information and to register.
Building Blue & Green Communities…One Small Business at a Time (Entrepreneur Education Center, Inc./AltaSea)
Join the Entrepreneur Educational Center, Inc. (EECI) and AltaSea for the first of six business seminars designed specifically for minority entrepreneurs interested in saving the environment. Learn how to take advantage of business and job opportunities in the rapidly growing Blue and Green Economy. There will also be an opportunity to enroll in EECI’s Miracle’s Adult Entrepreneur Program’s free Business Plan Development course to either open a start-up or transform your current business into a Blue or Green enterprise. All seminars will be held in the 2nd and 4th Districts of Los Angeles County.
Seminar 1:
Saturday, June 25, 2022 1:00pm-3:30pm
Magic Johnson Park, 905 E. El Segundo Blvd. Los Angeles, CA. 90059
Seminars are free and open to the public. More information coming soon. Check here for updates!
Leveraging Blue Economy Solutions for A Sustainable Goods Movement Ecosystem (AltaSea)
Thursday, June 30 10:00 am – 2:00 pm
A UN 2022 Oceans Conference Virtual Side Event
The Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, together with the region’s transportation corridors, comprise one of the most essential arteries of the world’s infrastructure and supply chain. Many of the solutions required to transform this goods movement ecosystem into the model ‘Port of the Future’ will come from innovative solutions in the green and blue economies. In this UN Side Event, members of a coalition of regional leaders will discuss how they are engaging in this multi-dimensional effort to build a sustainable goods movement ecosystem from the ground up. For more information, click here.
Panelists:
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Inna Braverman, Eco Wave Power
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Stephen Cheun, Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation
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Mike Galvin, Port of Los Angeles
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Terry Tamminen, AltaSea
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Gail Woodward, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Moderator:
ALTASEA COMMUNITY
Actions You Can Take on World Ocean Day (AltaSea)
June 8th marks World Ocean Day, the annual day dedicated to collective action in celebration of the oceans that make life on our blue planet possible. As the threats facing our oceans grow more dire by the year, World Ocean Day presents an important opportunity to reflect on the damage humans have done to our planet, learn about actions to reduce your personal impact, and partake in collective actions that champion ocean solutions.
DOE Announces Winners of 2022 Marine Energy Collegiate Competition (Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy)
Our own Jenny Krusoe, Founding Executive Director, served as one of the judges for the Marine Energy Collegiate Competition. 17 student-led competing teams developed designs and business plans to power blue economy activities using a diverse range of marine-energy technologies. Fourteen of the competitors also tested their designs in tanks of all sizes and capabilities across the country, and one team even tested their prototype in a lake. Find out more about the winners!
Blue economy sector reacts to governor’s proposed budget that includes billions for climate change, jobs (Spectrum News 1)
The possibilities are endless with an underwater drone, like one from Torrance-based company Blue Robotics. Founder and CEO Rusty Jehangir said the world is your oyster when it comes to how underwater robotics are used. “I just saw a video yesterday of somebody using it to, using machine vision coupled to this vehicle, to measure the sizes of scallops in New Zealand and monitor their scallop populations using all this cool technology, and it’s enabled through having vehicles like this that people can build on top of,” Jehangir said.
Blue Robotics is one of over 60 tech startups and entrepreneurs showcasing their innovative solutions to climate change at AltaSea at the Port of Los Angeles.
startBlue is looking for the next group of ocean-focused entrepreneurs (Scripps Institution of Oceanography & Rady School of Management)
Teams must address an ocean-related challenge with a science- and engineering-based solution. StartBlue Program Partners include The Port of San Diego and its Blue Economy Incubator, U.S. Coast Guard Blue Tech Center of Expertise, National Defense Industry Association, San Diego Military Advisory Council, AiiM Partners, AltaSea at the Port of Los Angeles, TMA BlueTech, CA Sea Grant, The Brink SBDC, and Ocean Visions. Teams must have a San Diego presence. Applications for cohort 2 will be accepted May 25 through July 8, 2022. Click here for more information.
MARINE SCIENCE
An ocean first: Underwater drone tracks CO2 in Alaska gulf (AP News)
In the cold, choppy waters of Alaska’s Resurrection Bay, all eyes were on the gray water, looking for one thing only. It wasn’t a spout from humpback whales that power through this scenic fjord, or a sea otter lazing on its back, munching a king crab. Instead, everyone aboard the Nanuq, a University of Alaska Fairbanks research vessel, was looking where a 5-foot (1.52-meter) long, bright pink underwater sea glider surfaced. The glider — believed to be the first configured with a large sensor to measure carbon dioxide levels in the ocean — had just completed its first overnight mission.
Call of the deep (Knowable Magazine)
There’s only one word for it: indescribable. “It’s one of those awesome experiences you can’t put into words,” says fish ecologist Simon Thorrold. Thorrold is trying to explain how it feels to dive into the ocean and attach a tag to a whale shark — the most stupendous fish in the sea. “Every single time I do it, I get this huge adrenaline rush,” he says. “That’s partly about the science and the mad race to get the tags fixed. But part of it is just being human and amazed by nature and huge animals.”
Using bacteria to accelerate CO2 capture in oceans (Phys.Org)
You may be familiar with direct air capture, or DAC, in which carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere in an effort to slow the effects of climate change. Now a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has proposed a scheme for direct ocean capture. Removing CO2 from the oceans will enable them to continue to do their job of absorbing excess CO2 from the atmosphere.
SUSTAINABLE AND INNOVATIVE BUSINESS
Sea-farmed supercrop: how seaweed could transform the way we live (The Guardian)
You can just see the buoys of the seafarm,” Dr Sophie Steinhagen yells over the high whine of the boat as it approaches the small islands of Sweden’s Koster archipelago. The engine drops to a sputter, and Steinhagen heaves up a rope to reveal the harvest hanging beneath: strand after strand of sea lettuce, translucent and emerald green.
Giant Deep Ocean Turbine Trial Offers Hope of Endless Green Power (yahoo!finance)
Power-hungry, fossil-fuel dependent Japan has successfully tested a system that could provide a constant, steady form of renewable energy, regardless of the wind or the sun. For more than a decade, Japanese heavy machinery maker IHI Corp. has been developing a subsea turbine that harnesses the energy in deep ocean currents and converts it into a steady and reliable source of electricity. The giant machine resembles an airplane, with two counter-rotating turbine fans in place of jets, and a central ‘fuselage’ housing a buoyancy adjustment system. Called Kairyu, the 330-ton prototype is designed to be anchored to the sea floor at a depth of 30-50 meters (100-160 feet).
Kelp Is Weirdly Great at Sucking Carbon Out of the Sky (The Atlantic)
Last month, somewhere off the coast of Maine, a small group of researchers and engineers released a series of tiny, floating objects into the water. The team called them “buoys,” but they looked more like a packet of uncooked ramen noodles glued to a green party streamer than anything of the navigational or weather-observing variety. These odd jellyfish had one role in life: to go away and never be seen again. With any luck, their successors would soon be released into the open ocean, where they would float away, absorb a small amount of carbon from the atmosphere, then sink to the bottom of the seafloor, where their residue would remain for thousands of years.
EDUCATION
Hyperrealistic Marine Life Portraits Highlight the Ocean’s Incredible Biodiversity (My Modern Met)
There is an abundance of life underwater that we rarely have a chance to see and appreciate. That is why Portland, Maine-based artist Zoe Keller is giving these diverse creatures a stage in her series titled Ocean Biodiversity. From octopus to starfish to jellyfish, the breadth of marine life is captured in her detailed digital depictions.
“I am fascinated by the dizzying array of lifeforms that we share this planet with,” she tells My Modern Met. “I love learning how a species has evolved to fit within its specific ecological niche, and how organisms are tied together in such intimate ways within a particular ecosystem. I also feel a great sense of urgency, living during the sixth mass extinction, to help tell the stories of those species that we stand to lose.”
Night lights make even the seas bright (Science News for Students)
Not even the sea is safe from the glare of humans’ light at night. Researchers published the first global atlas of ocean light pollution. It shows large chunks of the sea lit up at night. And that risks confusing or disrupting the behaviors of sea life.
Coastal cities cast haloes of light that stretch over the ocean. So do offshore oil rigs and other structures. In many places, the glow is powerful enough to penetrate deep into coastal waters. And that light risks changing behaviors of the creatures that live there.
