Port Quin seaweed farm

[ricardio]

Hadn't seen anything about this until I was down in Cornwall last week. Does anyone know what the RYA response to the consultation was and did the RYA let their members know? Sadly it doesn't look like an April fool's joke.
If the scheme goes ahead it looks like the end of Port Quin as an anchorage. If the company then goes bust the seabed will forever be littered with the rotting ground tackle.
The consultation period has now ended.
Seaweed Farms Port Quin
Huge seaweed farm the size of 140 football fields
Fight against huge seaweed farm approved 'without anyone knowing'

 

[RunAgroundHard]

It is offshore, outside the bay and away from the anchorage according to the map in the proposal, hardly and end to anchoring in the bay.

 

[Supertramp]

Did it propose a complete exclusion zone or just a no anchoring zone? I assume total exclusion because of all the buoys and lines.

Asking as a seaweed farm with total exclusion has been proposed off Abersoch.

 

[ricardio]

You are right, the proposal will not directly affect the anchorage but it won't improve access. I must admit I have never sailed in to Padstow but posted this as a heads up for those who do and may want to stop in the bay.

To my jaundiced eye I can’t see it as anything other than an attempt to privatise a sizeable bit of the sea. Details of the Camel Fish application (one of two) are at View application and documents - MCMS (marinemanagement.org.uk)

I found the applicant’s Marine Navigational Safety Assessment a bit of a laugh though. It relies on the expert and by implication the independent advice of the CEO of Biome Algae, the company that has applied for the second licence in the bay. I have not checked but it would be too funny if the assessment for the Biome application relied on the expert advice of the CEO of Camel Fish. Apparently the 144m x 160m grids of floating lines won’t be a navigational problem because there will be 20m wide channels between them. I also loved “It should be noted that the cost of decommissioning would be a fraction of the cost of deployment. The sale of the infrastructure and other CAPEX would easily cover the cost of decommissioning the site.”

For Supertramp’s info, the safety assessment reckons a vessel drawing 0.95m would be in danger of entanglement.

Anyway, all boxes ticked by the applicant, consultation period over so there you are.