The carbon recycling project

The initial stages of this project are to be carried out using current state-of-the-art equipment and materials donated by Great Stuff Hydroponics, with the practical work being spear-headed St. Michael's school in Watford.

St. Michael's school will initially be working on the three first stages of the project to prove the viability of the hydroponic growing methods using first conventional organic and then sea based nutrients. They will then move on to try and cutlivate the sea algae biomass on land. The outcomes of these experiments will then dictate how the project is to develop.

Stage 1 - Hydroponic cultivation experiment using organic nutrients
The project will start using equipment donated by "Great Stuff Hydroponics" and will seek to cultivate usable vegetable crops using the hydroponic method. The basis of this is to encourage plant life to grow suspended in a solution rather than buried in the soil. This allows the plant to put all its effort in to maturing upwards and outwards rather than having to fight it's way through soil just to reach daylight. In theory, this will help the plants to reach maturity earlier and with less energy, thus allowing the crop to produce a more nutrient rich yield.

Stage 2 - Hydroponic cultivation experiment using sea nutrients
Using the same equipment, we will seek to grow the same crops in the same method but using sea based nutrients as opposed to the traditional ogranic nutrients used in stage 1. This will show us the viability of using a sea water solution for growing crops in by this method.

Stage 3 - Land based cultivation of sea algae
Though this is the third stage of the project and will be carried out after the initial stages have yielded positive results it is, perhaps, the most important stage of the project. Being able to create the biomass of sea algae on land opens the door to creating a natural source of fertilisers on land right next to the sea, no matter what state that land is already in. Based on the principles of Dr. Maynard Murray's research, dating from the late 1930's through the 1950's, which showed that using sea based nutrients provided healthier crop yields, the natural sea algae fertiliser which results from this biomass should server a similar purpose. Due to the incredible rate of reproduction of this algae, it is possible to make a vast amount of it in a very short space of time (days!). This can then be used in vast amounts to change the nature of the ground in devastated areas changing it from practically sand, to a highly fertile medium for crop cultivation.

Please see our research pages for further explanations of the ideas for the above experiments.