🇳🇴 KSAT: Collaboration for monitoring and restoring Europe’s kelp forest

Over the past five decades, approximately 50% of global kelp forests have been lost, significantly impacting fish populations, exacerbating ocean acidification, diminishing carbon sequestration capacity, and reducing the effectiveness of nutrient removal from land runoff and aquaculture. This new partnership aims to deliver advanced technological solutions to support effective monitoring and sustainable management of sea forests.

– Seaweed is the largest marine vegetated ecosystem on the planet – over 20 times larger than the coral reefs. We need more information about the status of this important habitat, and we need to speed up restoration actions. This collaboration is a direct response to that need and represents a major step toward enabling monitoring and restoration at a meaningful, industrial scale, says Pål Bakken, founder and CEO of SeaForester.

From outer space to the deep ocean

SeaForester’s pioneering restoration work has demonstrated that large-scale recovery is both technically and economically feasible, but requires improved monitoring tools to guide, verify, and scale interventions. Space data for oceans includes information on sea surface temperature, height, and colour, collected by satellites to monitor climate, predict weather, and study ocean ecosystems. This will be essential for monitoring the kelp forest going forward.

– This data helps track currents, sea level rise, and the effects of climate change, as well as monitor phenomena like harmful algal blooms and ocean pollution. We are looking forward to contributing to these important issues for marine habitat restoration, and we believe that combining satellite data with measurements from the ocean is the key to providing deeper insights, says Børre Pedersen from KSAT.

Digital solutions for preserving life in the Ocean

Kongsberg Discovery has, for the last few years, been developing a digital solution that combines their hydroacoustic sensors for ecosystem monitoring and seafloor mapping with any other relevant ocean measurements and metadata into one solution intended for sustainable use of the ocean space.

– The SeaForester use case allows us to combine fractions of information into one holistic real-time information system for efficient monitoring and documentation of kelp forests’ biomass and corresponding ecosystems, says Tonny Algrøy, Sales Director for Ocean Science in Kongsberg Discovery.

The world’s biggest forest is valuable

The United Nations has set a target to restore 1 million hectares and conserve 3 million hectares of kelp forests worldwide by 2040. Current investments in nature-based solutions total around $133 billion per year, with projections indicating a likely increase in ocean-based initiatives. Increasing global food security, such as boosting harvestable fish stocks, is cited as a key factor for these anticipated investments by companies and governments. SeaForester is positioned to contribute significant verified data and practical experience toward achieving these global targets.

– To assess the impact of restoration efforts, accurate quantification and documentation are necessary. At present, there are limited industrial solutions available for mapping and measuring kelp forests and related marine ecosystems, highlighting a gap in the market across various sensing methods. I have great hopes for the positive effects of this partnership, says CEO Pål Bakken in SeaForester.