Meet Dr Mar Fernández-Méndez, co-founder of Seafields
Dr Mar Fernández-Méndez is a marine researcher, with an MSc in Marine Microbiology and a PhD in Biological Oceanography. She is currently the lead of a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, Germany. Her research covers a broad range, from phytoplankton ecology and primary productivity, marine carbon dioxide removal, artificial and natural upwelling systems, climate change impacts on ecosystems, carbon and nutrient biochemistry, carbon export, and microbial functional diversity.
She has helped to co-found and is the Lead Scientific Advisor at Seafields. Seafields is aiming to upscale her research about the floating seaweed Sargassum to develop and test offshore technologies to aquafarm at scale, tackling climate warming while also making it into a viable, profitable business at the same time. By setting up a hyper-scale seaweed farm that will become the world's biggest mega farm - on remote ocean currents holding vast floating fields of seaweed hundreds of miles from land. The plan is to sell carbon credits, and the project's backers believe this mega farm will ultimately draw a billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere yearly.
Tell us about the founder behind the brand?
I am a marine ecologist currently transitioning between research in polar and tropical seas, a lover of the oceans and climate optimist. I am working towards practical solutions to mitigate climate change by sequestering carbon through nature-based solutions.
Part of my PhD involved research into sea algae, and for this I was a regular visitor to the Arctic Ocean where I was able to see first-hand the devastating impacts on this pristine ecosystem from the effect of climate change and global temperature rises. It was then that I started to move my focus towards finding practical solutions to the climate crisis.
I am also a mother and I firmly believe that we need to stay optimistic and find solutions to the climate crisis for our future generations and take practical action now to not only meet carbon dioxide emission reduction and removal targets to achieve net-zero, but also to go beyond this to sequester historic CO2 emission.
What inspired you to launch your business and what is the end goal?
I have an inspiring long-term mentor, Prof Victor Smetacek, who introduced me to the seaweed Sargassum and the concept of the perpetual salt fountain for artificial upwelling (which is a way of using the energy of the temperature and salinity differences in the ocean to bring nutrient rich waters to the surface and fertilise the seaweed). I could see that this was a promising avenue for research and began to focus my research on Sargassum and its carbon sequestration potential. Sargassum has many desirable properties - it is free-floating, has a high carbon sequestration efficiency and grows very rapidly (it can double in weight in a mere 1-3 weeks, depending on conditions). It also has the potential to be used for a variety of other products as an alternative to fossil fuels.
I have helped to co-found and am the Lead Scientific Advisor at Seafields, who are aiming to upscale my research into Sargassum to sequester carbon and be part of the solution for climate change. We are currently developing a solution to grow the Sargassum offshore in the ocean deserts (the subtropical gyres) - providing it with nutrients from the deep waters using double upwelling pipes.
The seaweed sequesters carbon while growing and then we will harvest and process it at sea to extract the valuable products. We will then go on to bale and sink the rest into the abyssal plane of the deep oceans to store the remaining carbon. We carefully monitor the surface with biogeochemical sensors, drones and satellites and will collaborate with independent researchers to perform environmental impact assessments of the sinking of seaweed bales in the deep sea with state-of-the-art cameras and sensors.
We are looking at a number of uses of Sargassum for making products, for example with C-Cause – (a project partnership led by The Alfred Wegener Institute, Carbonwave, GEOMAR, Seafields) we are trying to optimise pathways to turn Sargassum biomass into ethanol for engineered plastics that will also store CO2 long-term.
We are aiming to have a fully first full-sized aquafarm in 2024 and will be working to scale production from there with the ambition for megaton scale by 2027/8 and gigaton by 29/30.
What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learnt so far as an entrepreneur?
That acquiring funding to be able to design and test the first prototype of your idea, is as complicated as it is in academia to apply for a grant to fund your research. And that in the end, what matters the most is that you feel comfortable working with your co-founders, because you will all put in a lot of effort and extra hours and you need to share the vision and have the feeling that you are all swimming in the same direction. It's also important to learn from each other since we all have different backgrounds and expertise. I have for example learned a lot about business, PR and finance from my amazing co-founder John Auckland, and I think that by now he has also learned from me quite a lot about the biology of Sargassum.
What is your day-to-day role with the company?
As a lead scientific advisor I make sure that all decisions made about the operations are following the latest scientific consensus. We meet weekly to discuss where and how to perform our upcoming trials and which scientific instruments are needed to monitor Sargassums growth, carbon uptake, nutrient uptake etc. I also coordinate our board of scientific advisors so that we can reach out to them when we have specific questions.
What keeps you motivated as an entrepreneur when you hit bumps in the road?
As a scientist we are used to dealing with the challenges of translating our research into practical solutions, the complexities of moving from vision to reality and the patience and meticulous work to get the data that it takes. When you hit any problems, it helps to have a clear goal in place and the urgency of the climate crisis is a great motivator in tough times. It is important to make sure that you enjoy the things you are doing and that will give motivation to push through the frustrating times.
How do you set yourself apart from other businesses in your industry?
Blue carbon is an area which has not received the focus it deserves. We have known for a long time about the importance in carbon sequestration of mangroves, tidal marshes, seagrasses and kelp forests but there are a number of exciting avenues of research in the field of ocean-based carbon dioxide removal.
Seafields will permanently sequester CO2 in the deep ocean (additional carbon removal) and help decarbonize the chemical industry (avoided emissions) while restoring our oceans' productivity and increasing biodiversity. Our approach consists of aquafarming sargassum seaweed in the open ocean (Atlantic), processing its biomass to extract nutrients and fossil fuel replacing products, followed by baling and sinking the carbon-rich residual to the deep abyssal plain.
We see ourselves as among one of the many solutions that will be needed to achieve the goals needed to combat climate change, so we have to get away from the mindset of ‘competitors’ and work together to find solutions. The academic world is very collaborative, and we have taken this one stage further and I co-host a Sargassum podcast where we speak to a range of scientists and entrepreneurs about their amazing work to fight sargassum influxes in the Caribbean, climate change and biodiversity loss.
The Seafields team is uniquely placed to face the challenges needed to sequester carbon at scale and we have not just top scientists and experts in marine ecology but experts on farming, marine engineering, even deep-sea ocean work and marine law. To build a mega-farm the size of Croatia, also very much sets us apart.
With all the success stories around entrepreneurship and how innovative people have to be to take the leap. How do you think you’ve innovated your sector and why?
Big problems require big solutions. We have to innovate and create an entire new industry of carbon dioxide removal technologies if we want to clean up the mess we have made during the last 100 years emitting Gts of CO2 to the atmosphere. At the beginning I was sceptical about such large-scale implementations in the ocean, but when I understood the magnitude of the problem and how badly marine ecosystems are already impacted by climate change, I realised that there is no other way forward than to rapidly scale up our most promising CDR approaches.
I don’t think there are many other founders out there who would be brave enough to develop at such scale a floating industry in the middle of the ocean, miles from anywhere and that will be sequestering 1Gt of carbon each year from the atmosphere. It is very challenging, and we are definitely pushing the boundaries of logistics, but we have to try.
What plans do you have for Seafields over the next two years?
We are currently running a number of research lines to progress our research into Sargassum and to overcome the challenges we need to aquafarm in the open oceans. This year we have been focused on deploying a modular, free floating barrier in St Vincent and we have had success in containing Sargassum. We have built the first open ocean Sargassum 'pen' which is an important step to having a fully functioning aquafarm. There will be further design iterations to make sure that the containment works in competing wind and current conditions.
We have ongoing trials in Mexico where we are testing Sargassum growth rates under different conditions, using biogeochemical tracers and sensors, drones and satellites. We have obtained clear data showing Sargassum's effectiveness at sequestering CO2, and we are close to understanding what concentration of nutrients we need to upwell to achieve optimum growth.
We will be performing trials of our baling and sinking process in Bermuda in Q4 of this year where we will bale and sink around 30 Sargassum bales so we can monitor their degradation rates. We are sinking them in the abyssal plain on the deep ocean floor and we will collaborate with independent researchers to perform careful environmental impact assessments with cameras and sensors. Early next year we will be manufacturing our first prototype pipes and testing the ability of these double upwelling pipes to provide the Sargassum with nutrients from the deep waters.
The ongoing work in the next few years will be to use our extensive data to scale our work, the practicalities of achieving what we need at the scale to sequester carbon dioxide at the megaton and gigaton level are immense but we have the right team in place to meet the many steps needed along the way.
Does your company help the community that you’re located in?
As you can see from the image below about our plans for aquafarm location, in order to scale our aquafarms, we will need to work with a number of local communities. We have already started this work and have an experienced team on the ground in St Vincent and in Mexico. In all of our work the local team is vital, not just in knowing the local oceans and the best locations for our work but they are also deeply invested in the project as they have seen the impact of climate change on their local ecosystem and biodiversity.
The teams in local areas also play a vital role in educating around our solution and how we are turning a seaweed, which when it washes up on the beaches from the great Sargassum belt can cause significant problems for the local coastal ecosystem, health and tourism. We want people to see that we are turning Sargassum from a problem into an opportunity for their communities both economically by providing jobs but also to fight climate change. Our plans are for new aquaculture of Sargassum in the open oceans with containment barriers so that there is no competition with coastal ecosystems. Sargassum can be used as a resource not only for carbon sequestration but also to be made into a lot of innovative products and replace products which are being made from fossil fuels and provide new areas of innovation and opportunity in these areas too.
Why do you think your business has had such a positive impact across your industry?
There is an emphasis when talking about carbon sequestration to talk about planting trees and trees are obviously a large part of the worlds’ carbon sequestration. But when we are talking about adding additionality to the planet's carbon sequestration there are drawbacks - they compete for land space, fertilisers and freshwater resources. They also take time to grow and to sequester, and there are risks of wildfires, especially given the recent historic heat waves caused by climate change. I knew from my extensive work with the oceans that they would be a key part to the solutions of climate change.
Why do you think now is the right time for the world to begin exploring and adopting technology that aids sustainability?
Climate change is the most urgent issue facing the world today and there is a vital need for urgent action. As scientists, we have been telling the world and the politicians for decades the urgent problems we face – the world is warming, there are no pristine ecosystems left on the planet, the oceans are acidifying. It is easy to feel powerless, but it is important that scientists move from knowledge of the problems we are facing to action. Our planet warming is the stark reality we face collectively and CO2 emission reduction, albeit vital, won't be enough. Even stopping ongoing carbon emissions altogether will not prevent the planet's trajectory. Even if we achieve net-zero, the critical ingredient is sequestering the 1500GT of historic CO2 to return to safe pre-industrial revolution levels.
We are currently entered in the Carbon Removal X prize (the largest incentive prize in history at $100M) along with the Ocean Visions Launchpad and this competition highlights that are so many innovative companies working in this space. As soon as I understood the magnitude of climate change during my years at university, I decided that my career would be focused on finding solutions to mitigate its impacts. I always wanted to be a scientist and work with the oceans, so I started in academic research due to my innate curiosity. However, I have now started to realise that if my research is to have a global impact, I need to move more towards becoming an entrepreneur and that is why I co-founded Seafields. I think that more and more scientists need to start working to bridge the gap between research and practical action, not just in nature-enhancing solutions like ours but in other innovative climate tech companies. The problem is vast and complex, and it will require multiple lines of research and development all running at once to find the range of solutions we need to have an impact on the crisis.
