Optimal Post-Harvest Handling & Storage | Farmer Forum
Recorded on January 26, 2023
This webinar explores critical post-harvest handling practices that preserve kelp quality after harvest. GreenWave’s Sam Garwin, Director of Market Development, alongside produce packaging experts Jeff Brandenburg and Eric Vandercook, discuss the science of kelp respiration, storage container options, and packaging innovations. The conversation covers the findings about sugar kelp’s 14-day potential shelf life when properly handled, while emphasizing that post-harvest handling directly determines possible end uses for harvested kelp.
Chapters
00:00 – Introduction and Post-Harvest Concepts
Sam Garwin introduces key concepts about post-harvest handling, quality indicators, and best practices
12:40 – Kelp Respiration Research
Explanation of how kelp “breathes” after harvest and findings from respiration rate studies
20:21 – Storage Container Study Results
Findings on different storage containers and their impact on kelp quality
28:39 – Modified Atmosphere Packaging
Specialized packaging solutions for extending fresh kelp shelf life
35:59 – Expert Q&A Session
Brandenburg and Vandercook answer farmer questions about handling temperature, container options, and quality preservation.
Transcript
1 00:00:00.600 --> 00:00:01.300 encourage you to either 2 00:00:02.900 --> 00:00:06.200 we encourage you to either raise your 3 00:00:05.200 --> 00:00:08.300 hand or to put 4 00:00:08.300 --> 00:00:12.100 a question in the Q&A function 5 00:00:11.100 --> 00:00:14.100 at the bottom of the bottom of the call, and 6 00:00:14.100 --> 00:00:16.400 I'm going to work on trying to get you chat functionality as well. 7 00:00:18.800 --> 00:00:21.900 And so with that I am going I think we asked 8 00:00:21.900 --> 00:00:24.300 everyone to want to ask everyone to introduce themselves, but 9 00:00:24.300 --> 00:00:27.300 I don't think about capability at the moment. So we'll 10 00:00:27.300 --> 00:00:30.300 we'll do that a little bit later in the call. And in 11 00:00:30.300 --> 00:00:31.900 the meantime, I will kick it over to Sam. 12 00:00:34.100 --> 00:00:37.400 Awesome. Thank you Lindsey. I'm Sam 13 00:00:37.400 --> 00:00:40.800 Garen director of Market development at greenwave. And 14 00:00:40.800 --> 00:00:43.000 I apologize. My sound was not working for a few 15 00:00:43.100 --> 00:00:47.000 seconds there. So I don't know if Lindsay said anything about me but as director 16 00:00:46.100 --> 00:00:49.400 of Market development, I'm responsible for 17 00:00:49.400 --> 00:00:52.200 thinking about everything that happens after the kelp comes out of 18 00:00:52.200 --> 00:00:55.300 the water which doesn't include post Harvest handling but also things 19 00:00:55.300 --> 00:00:58.600 like value chain coordination sales and 20 00:00:58.600 --> 00:01:01.500 marketing of kelp and that sort 21 00:01:01.500 --> 00:01:04.100 of thing and we are joined today 22 00:01:04.100 --> 00:01:08.000 by two experts in a produce 23 00:01:07.500 --> 00:01:11.700 packaging who worked with us on the studies 24 00:01:11.700 --> 00:01:15.200 that we're about to show share with you. They are Jeff Brandenburg 25 00:01:14.200 --> 00:01:17.200 and Eric Vandercook and you will have an 26 00:01:17.200 --> 00:01:19.600 opportunity to ask them questions a little bit later on. 27 00:01:21.500 --> 00:01:24.200 So our agenda today, we're going to be going over 28 00:01:24.200 --> 00:01:27.600 some key Concepts when it comes to post Harvest handling and quality. 29 00:01:27.600 --> 00:01:30.900 We are going to talk about some existing handling and 30 00:01:30.900 --> 00:01:33.800 storage best practices and then dive 31 00:01:33.800 --> 00:01:36.400 into our research. We did two different studies over the 32 00:01:36.400 --> 00:01:39.300 course of the last two years and then 33 00:01:39.300 --> 00:01:42.200 we're going to talk about some upcoming research and of course leave plenty of times for 34 00:01:42.200 --> 00:01:42.700 discussion. 35 00:01:44.800 --> 00:01:48.400 So to kick us off with the concepts, what 36 00:01:47.400 --> 00:01:51.800 is post-harvest handling? We this 37 00:01:50.800 --> 00:01:53.600 is not something that is unique to CBD 38 00:01:53.600 --> 00:01:57.200 post Harvest handling is a stage of agricultural production. 39 00:01:56.200 --> 00:01:59.600 It is a stage immediately following 40 00:01:59.600 --> 00:02:03.100 Harvest and this includes Transportation cooling 41 00:02:02.100 --> 00:02:05.800 cleaning sorting packing anything 42 00:02:05.800 --> 00:02:08.600 that's in that limbo State between when CV comes 43 00:02:08.600 --> 00:02:11.400 out of the water and where when it gets into some form 44 00:02:11.400 --> 00:02:15.700 of stabilized stabilization, whether 45 00:02:15.700 --> 00:02:18.600 that's packaging or freezing or 46 00:02:18.600 --> 00:02:21.000 whatever it is you're going to do to it and this is 47 00:02:21.300 --> 00:02:25.000 really the most important period of time to preserve quality 48 00:02:24.600 --> 00:02:27.400 again, not just for seaweed but for anything 49 00:02:27.400 --> 00:02:30.800 from grains to milk to meet this 50 00:02:30.800 --> 00:02:34.000 is what really really determines the possible end 51 00:02:33.400 --> 00:02:36.800 uses for your product. You can never add 52 00:02:36.800 --> 00:02:39.200 quality you can only preserve it. 53 00:02:39.200 --> 00:02:42.200 And so that's what this that's why this post Harvest handling stage is really 54 00:02:42.200 --> 00:02:42.800 really important. 55 00:02:45.500 --> 00:02:48.600 Going one level deeper in this presentation. We're 56 00:02:48.600 --> 00:02:51.100 going to be talking about quality shelf life 57 00:02:51.100 --> 00:02:54.200 and a little bit about food safety. Although food 58 00:02:54.200 --> 00:02:58.200 safety is really not the focus of this presentation. That is 59 00:02:58.200 --> 00:03:01.200 an area in which sea Grant has covering extremely thoroughly and 60 00:03:01.200 --> 00:03:04.200 will point you to some resources there that you can 61 00:03:04.200 --> 00:03:07.300 look at with more if you want to get into more detail on 62 00:03:07.300 --> 00:03:11.500 food safety, but let's start with shelf life 63 00:03:11.500 --> 00:03:14.400 here the middle one. So shelf life is the length of 64 00:03:14.400 --> 00:03:17.200 time during which a product any food product 65 00:03:17.200 --> 00:03:20.800 remains desirable and in direct shelf 66 00:03:20.800 --> 00:03:23.500 life testing products are stored under conditions similar to 67 00:03:23.500 --> 00:03:26.700 those that they will actually face in real life and monitored over 68 00:03:26.700 --> 00:03:30.100 regular intervals for signs of deterioration. A product 69 00:03:30.100 --> 00:03:33.600 save. The shelf life is not a guarantee, but rather a statement 70 00:03:33.600 --> 00:03:36.300 of high likelihood that a product 71 00:03:36.300 --> 00:03:41.500 will mean will remain usable for the time indicated under 72 00:03:41.500 --> 00:03:43.100 typical supply chain conditions. 73 00:03:44.100 --> 00:03:47.400 And the expected shelf life has implications for 74 00:03:47.400 --> 00:03:50.500 upstream or Downstream rather supply chain logistics. For 75 00:03:50.500 --> 00:03:53.600 example, if a product total shelf life is 14 days 76 00:03:53.600 --> 00:03:56.200 and a given retailer requires a shelf life of 10 77 00:03:56.200 --> 00:03:59.100 days minimum. That means that the product needs to be received by 78 00:03:59.100 --> 00:04:02.400 the retailer within four days of production, which depending on where your 79 00:04:02.400 --> 00:04:04.400 product is coming from could be pretty challenging. 80 00:04:05.300 --> 00:04:08.400 And shelf life is not the same thing as food safety though. 81 00:04:08.400 --> 00:04:11.700 The two concepts are related. So food safety refers 82 00:04:11.700 --> 00:04:15.400 to practices that prevent contamination pathogen pathogen 83 00:04:15.400 --> 00:04:18.200 growth and spoilage that can cause illness in humans 84 00:04:18.200 --> 00:04:21.600 and a product that has gone beyond its 85 00:04:21.600 --> 00:04:24.300 expected shelf life is likely not in an 86 00:04:24.300 --> 00:04:28.000 optimal state of quality, but it may still be physical physically safe 87 00:04:27.300 --> 00:04:30.400 to consume in contrast. If 88 00:04:30.400 --> 00:04:33.600 the handling of a product has violated food safety 89 00:04:33.600 --> 00:04:36.900 best practices, it is not safe to consume regardless 90 00:04:36.900 --> 00:04:39.400 of whether or not it might look good or whether 91 00:04:39.400 --> 00:04:43.000 it is within its technical stated shelf 92 00:04:42.100 --> 00:04:45.200 life because it has been abused and so you shouldn't be 93 00:04:45.200 --> 00:04:46.100 consuming that 94 00:04:46.900 --> 00:04:50.100 So our Focus here is really on Commercial considerations 95 00:04:49.100 --> 00:04:53.200 of shelf life and quality rather 96 00:04:52.200 --> 00:04:55.600 than food safety, and we're 97 00:04:55.600 --> 00:04:59.200 going to dive a little bit deeper into what we mean by quality. The 98 00:04:58.200 --> 00:05:01.600 short definition is measurable standards 99 00:05:01.600 --> 00:05:04.200 to sort and grade seaweed. 100 00:05:05.100 --> 00:05:08.500 What does that even mean? What are these measurable standards? We 101 00:05:08.500 --> 00:05:09.600 are talking about. 102 00:05:12.800 --> 00:05:15.300 The industry really has yet to 103 00:05:15.300 --> 00:05:19.300 arrive at a mutually agreed upon set of Standards, but most 104 00:05:18.300 --> 00:05:21.400 large processors have developed some 105 00:05:21.400 --> 00:05:24.500 internal quality guidelines, which they use to 106 00:05:24.500 --> 00:05:27.300 decide which CB that they receive is going 107 00:05:27.300 --> 00:05:30.400 to which purposes and some of the time this is going to be tied to 108 00:05:30.400 --> 00:05:33.400 different pricing tiers and we've listed 109 00:05:33.400 --> 00:05:36.600 out some things here that are specific indicators that 110 00:05:36.600 --> 00:05:40.200 real buyers today are using when evaluating seaweed 111 00:05:39.200 --> 00:05:42.600 quality a lot of these are visual 112 00:05:42.600 --> 00:05:45.600 so like color surface moisture appearance and 113 00:05:45.600 --> 00:05:48.400 texture all of that you get just by looking at the seaweed, 114 00:05:48.400 --> 00:05:51.300 but then there's also odor like does it 115 00:05:51.300 --> 00:05:54.200 smell like nothing does it smell vegetable? Does it 116 00:05:54.200 --> 00:05:57.700 stink? There's also temperature. So 117 00:05:57.700 --> 00:06:00.700 you're gonna see in these studies. We looked a lot at whether 118 00:06:00.700 --> 00:06:03.400 containers of seaweed. We're 119 00:06:03.400 --> 00:06:06.400 able to cool quickly or even whether he got 120 00:06:06.400 --> 00:06:10.800 started to be generated from chemical properties 121 00:06:10.800 --> 00:06:12.300 or chemical processes rather. 122 00:06:12.800 --> 00:06:15.000 That were happening to the seaweed as it sat there. 123 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:19.100 And then there's also sound so if fermentation 124 00:06:18.100 --> 00:06:24.500 occurs in a pile 125 00:06:23.500 --> 00:06:26.200 of seaweed, basically you will be able 126 00:06:26.200 --> 00:06:29.400 to hear it because it will be bubbling you have to get quiet you 127 00:06:29.400 --> 00:06:32.800 have to listen for it. So these are all indicators of quality and 128 00:06:32.800 --> 00:06:35.400 any one of these can be taken as an indication 129 00:06:35.400 --> 00:06:36.400 of deterioration. 130 00:06:39.700 --> 00:06:42.300 There are also some quality considerations that have nothing to 131 00:06:42.300 --> 00:06:45.500 do with the kelp itself. But all they're all about how it 132 00:06:45.500 --> 00:06:49.400 is handled and this is by no means an exhaustive list, but bios 133 00:06:48.400 --> 00:06:51.600 buyers might also be looking for bio-fouling. So 134 00:06:51.600 --> 00:06:54.300 like organisms that are in the ocean that end up on the kelp. 135 00:06:54.900 --> 00:06:57.300 Debris seed string is a really common one, 136 00:06:57.300 --> 00:07:00.300 but there can also be bits of plastic from baskets or 137 00:07:00.300 --> 00:07:03.400 you know, I saw a 138 00:07:03.400 --> 00:07:06.600 picture of one buyer found a penny in their 139 00:07:06.600 --> 00:07:09.500 seaweed. So any number of things can get in there including 140 00:07:09.500 --> 00:07:12.600 sediment buyers might also care about the size 141 00:07:12.600 --> 00:07:16.000 about of the blades or the stipes. They 142 00:07:15.200 --> 00:07:18.600 might be looking for you to trim or sort your CV to 143 00:07:18.600 --> 00:07:22.100 spec and then they could be looking for tests and cold chain documentation. And 144 00:07:21.100 --> 00:07:24.100 we have a lot of plans to work with 145 00:07:24.100 --> 00:07:27.500 industry stakeholders to Define which of these markets are most critical 146 00:07:27.500 --> 00:07:30.200 to and products quality, but it's useful to 147 00:07:30.200 --> 00:07:33.100 know from the start that these are some additional considerations. 148 00:07:36.600 --> 00:07:40.700 When it comes to existing best practices, we're broken 149 00:07:40.700 --> 00:07:43.700 it down into two areas Harvest and storage and 150 00:07:43.700 --> 00:07:47.000 these are kind of combinations of quality 151 00:07:46.900 --> 00:07:50.300 and food safety considerations. 152 00:07:51.300 --> 00:07:54.700 For the Harvest we obviously want to keep everything clean and sterile anything 153 00:07:54.700 --> 00:07:57.500 that is going to come into contact with the kelp which on 154 00:07:57.500 --> 00:08:00.200 a boat could be a lot of things. We want to make sure that those 155 00:08:00.200 --> 00:08:03.300 are clean. We want to avoid that 156 00:08:03.300 --> 00:08:06.500 biofile as much as possible taking care not to cut the seed string. 157 00:08:06.500 --> 00:08:09.000 We really don't want to come pack the kelp and 158 00:08:09.200 --> 00:08:12.100 this is it's actually interesting. This is the best practice because this is one of 159 00:08:12.100 --> 00:08:15.200 the things that are our findings was 160 00:08:15.200 --> 00:08:18.800 looking or sorry. Our studies was looking to validate was why? Why 161 00:08:18.800 --> 00:08:20.900 don't we want to compact that? Kelp? 162 00:08:22.400 --> 00:08:25.300 And then of course we want to protect that 163 00:08:25.300 --> 00:08:28.400 kelp from extreme temperatures, but also from dirt for an 164 00:08:28.400 --> 00:08:31.300 objects direct sunlight and fresh water all of which can impact 165 00:08:31.300 --> 00:08:34.600 those quality measurements that 166 00:08:34.600 --> 00:08:36.400 we listed on the earlier slide. 167 00:08:37.900 --> 00:08:40.100 Once kelp is put into storage. We 168 00:08:40.100 --> 00:08:43.400 want to get it cool as quickly as possible. Ideally within eight 169 00:08:43.400 --> 00:08:46.400 hours of harvest but the sooner the better and we want to monitor that 170 00:08:46.400 --> 00:08:50.700 temperature throughout storage and you can either do that yourself a 171 00:08:50.700 --> 00:08:54.400 couple times a day or there are temperature loggers, which 172 00:08:53.400 --> 00:08:56.200 we will refer to later. We're 173 00:08:56.200 --> 00:08:59.800 happy to send your resources on those that you can stick inside the containers and 174 00:08:59.800 --> 00:09:02.700 you can get a measurement as you 175 00:09:02.700 --> 00:09:05.300 know, continuously as the kelp isn't 176 00:09:05.300 --> 00:09:05.500 storage. 177 00:09:06.400 --> 00:09:08.500 We want to be keeping seaweed moist but not wet. 178 00:09:09.400 --> 00:09:12.400 Similar to the compacting the help we do not want to cut off access to 179 00:09:12.400 --> 00:09:15.700 our entirely and we want to process that kelp ideally within 180 00:09:15.700 --> 00:09:16.600 48 hours. 181 00:09:21.800 --> 00:09:24.300 And these best practices as well as many 182 00:09:24.300 --> 00:09:27.700 others are documented in these really really excellent resources produced by 183 00:09:27.700 --> 00:09:30.600 seagrant as well as the ocean-approved. Kelp Marvin kelp 184 00:09:30.600 --> 00:09:33.600 farming manual and we strongly recommend checking out those resources 185 00:09:33.600 --> 00:09:36.700 and continuing to check back as secret continues 186 00:09:36.700 --> 00:09:39.400 to do some really important work around food safety. 187 00:09:43.500 --> 00:09:43.800 So 188 00:09:44.800 --> 00:09:45.300 and 189 00:09:46.200 --> 00:09:47.900 getting into our research here. 190 00:09:49.400 --> 00:09:52.100 We can also pause and see if there's any questions on any of 191 00:09:52.100 --> 00:09:53.300 that. Shall we pause? 192 00:09:54.500 --> 00:09:58.000 Yeah, sure there haven't been any questions that comment folks 193 00:09:57.100 --> 00:10:00.200 the chat is open now and feel free to put 194 00:10:00.200 --> 00:10:03.300 questions in the chat or in the Q&A function. I'll be 195 00:10:03.300 --> 00:10:06.300 monitoring both and if you want to ask the question, you can raise your hand 196 00:10:06.300 --> 00:10:09.300 and we'll let you please speak. 197 00:10:11.800 --> 00:10:12.300 awesome 198 00:10:13.200 --> 00:10:14.100 Okay, we will continue on. 199 00:10:15.100 --> 00:10:19.100 All right. So over the last couple of years we did 200 00:10:18.100 --> 00:10:21.700 two different studies. Both of them were related 201 00:10:21.700 --> 00:10:24.800 to kelp quality and shelf life. These were 202 00:10:24.800 --> 00:10:27.900 pilot scale commercial research 203 00:10:27.900 --> 00:10:30.200 projects and by that, 204 00:10:30.200 --> 00:10:33.500 I mean that these were not rigorous scientific 205 00:10:33.500 --> 00:10:36.700 studies. We had a pretty small sample size wasn't replicated 206 00:10:36.700 --> 00:10:39.800 as many times as you normally would like in a proper R&D setting 207 00:10:39.800 --> 00:10:42.500 and in 2023 and Beyond we're looking 208 00:10:42.500 --> 00:10:45.400 to move away from doing as much R&D ourself in favor 209 00:10:45.400 --> 00:10:48.700 of commercial pilots and partnership with R&D Partners. However, 210 00:10:48.700 --> 00:10:51.400 we hope that this work contributes to a body 211 00:10:51.400 --> 00:10:54.400 of knowledge in the broader kelp community and that 212 00:10:54.400 --> 00:10:57.400 the academic Community can can build on these findings in 213 00:10:57.400 --> 00:10:57.900 years to come. 214 00:10:58.900 --> 00:11:01.500 But the projects were a few 215 00:11:01.500 --> 00:11:04.300 things. The first was that we wanted to investigate the 216 00:11:04.300 --> 00:11:07.500 respiration rate of kelp. We'll talk about what respiration rate 217 00:11:07.500 --> 00:11:10.200 is in a second. And we also wanted to look at the impact of 218 00:11:10.200 --> 00:11:13.300 storage containers different types of storage containers on 219 00:11:13.300 --> 00:11:14.200 shelf life. 220 00:11:15.400 --> 00:11:19.000 Using the findings from that we wanted to design packaging specifically 221 00:11:18.300 --> 00:11:21.100 for fresh sugar. Kelp and then we also 222 00:11:21.100 --> 00:11:26.000 wanted to think about how does sugar kelp compare to standards that 223 00:11:25.400 --> 00:11:29.000 exist for produce? Because if 224 00:11:28.100 --> 00:11:31.500 we are considering kelp in in the food space that 225 00:11:31.500 --> 00:11:34.400 is what a lot of people think of as a 226 00:11:34.400 --> 00:11:36.200 similar product on the market. 227 00:11:41.400 --> 00:11:45.300 Okay. So what is a respiration rate when 228 00:11:44.300 --> 00:11:47.500 we buy fruits and vegetables 229 00:11:47.500 --> 00:11:50.700 from the Farmers Market at the grocery store? We have an implicit understanding 230 00:11:50.700 --> 00:11:54.400 that they are in some way still alive. So 231 00:11:53.400 --> 00:11:56.800 they're no longer touched to the plant and if 232 00:11:56.800 --> 00:11:59.200 we keep them around long enough, they eventually begin to 233 00:11:59.200 --> 00:12:02.600 die but in the period between when the produce is 234 00:12:02.600 --> 00:12:06.000 harvested and when it dies it that 235 00:12:05.100 --> 00:12:09.800 is when we eat it and that product has 236 00:12:08.800 --> 00:12:11.900 metabolic reactions happening 237 00:12:11.900 --> 00:12:14.900 within it. So specifically the tissues 238 00:12:14.900 --> 00:12:17.300 that once performed photosynthesis. So using 239 00:12:17.300 --> 00:12:20.600 sunlight to synthesize nutrients and oxygen 240 00:12:20.600 --> 00:12:24.500 from carbon dioxide and water switches to respiration 241 00:12:23.500 --> 00:12:26.300 and respiration is the same 242 00:12:26.300 --> 00:12:29.300 exact activity that humans and all other 243 00:12:29.300 --> 00:12:32.000 animals are performing day in and out. It's also known as 244 00:12:32.500 --> 00:12:34.500 breathing so your kelp 245 00:12:35.100 --> 00:12:38.200 was in the water it was it was photosynthesizing comes out 246 00:12:38.200 --> 00:12:39.400 of the water starts to breathe. 247 00:12:40.500 --> 00:12:44.100 kind of crazy to think about but in respiration sugar 248 00:12:43.100 --> 00:12:46.700 glucose is combined with oxygen and 249 00:12:46.700 --> 00:12:50.000 transformed into carbon dioxide water and heat 250 00:12:49.600 --> 00:12:52.500 and when respiration ends 251 00:12:52.500 --> 00:12:56.600 and this organism dies and that 252 00:12:55.600 --> 00:12:58.300 happens when all the glucose in 253 00:12:58.300 --> 00:13:01.300 the tissues has been used up and it is 254 00:13:01.300 --> 00:13:03.400 impossible to increase the amount of glucose in 255 00:13:04.400 --> 00:13:08.000 That organism that is no longer performing photosynthesis. So 256 00:13:07.100 --> 00:13:10.200 the only thing you can do to slow down that 257 00:13:10.200 --> 00:13:14.000 process of dying essentially is 258 00:13:13.200 --> 00:13:16.200 to control the speed or the rate of 259 00:13:16.200 --> 00:13:19.500 respiration. So a respiration rate is the is the 260 00:13:19.500 --> 00:13:22.200 speed at which all that glucose is being used up and your 261 00:13:22.200 --> 00:13:24.000 kelp is going from being 262 00:13:25.400 --> 00:13:26.600 kind of alive to being 263 00:13:27.500 --> 00:13:27.900 dead 264 00:13:28.600 --> 00:13:31.300 and the slower respiration happens the more 265 00:13:31.300 --> 00:13:32.100 time you have. 266 00:13:33.300 --> 00:13:36.800 To for the for in that kind of limbo land. 267 00:13:40.600 --> 00:13:43.100 So why do we care about respiration rate when it comes 268 00:13:43.100 --> 00:13:46.300 to extending food quality we want to keep respiration rates as 269 00:13:46.300 --> 00:13:49.700 low as possible without killing the product. So again, 270 00:13:49.700 --> 00:13:52.400 we can't control the glucose. So we have to control these 271 00:13:52.400 --> 00:13:55.400 other aspects of respiration the things that contribute 272 00:13:55.400 --> 00:13:58.100 to the respiration rate and a big one here in the 273 00:13:58.100 --> 00:14:01.600 one that we are really focused on for these studies is access to oxygen but 274 00:14:01.600 --> 00:14:05.000 other things that affect the respiration rate can be damaged to 275 00:14:05.200 --> 00:14:08.800 the tissue so physical abuse temperature abuse 276 00:14:08.800 --> 00:14:11.800 or even things like light exposure and all 277 00:14:11.800 --> 00:14:14.400 of this stuff is relevant to storage conditions for 278 00:14:14.400 --> 00:14:17.500 any Market, but this is also relevant for the high-end fresh 279 00:14:17.500 --> 00:14:19.700 food service or retail markets. 280 00:14:22.700 --> 00:14:25.800 So the first study that we did we actually 281 00:14:25.800 --> 00:14:28.200 did twice. We did a very brief version of 282 00:14:28.200 --> 00:14:32.100 it in 2021 and then we did a longer 283 00:14:31.100 --> 00:14:35.000 version of it in 2022. And 284 00:14:34.400 --> 00:14:37.700 in this study we harvested 285 00:14:37.700 --> 00:14:40.400 sugar kelp from our farm The Greenway 286 00:14:40.400 --> 00:14:44.900 Farm on Thimble Island, and we took 287 00:14:43.900 --> 00:14:46.300 the kelp put into a mesh 288 00:14:46.300 --> 00:14:49.500 bag in a cooler with ice and transported it 289 00:14:49.500 --> 00:14:52.800 directly to a Testing Lab 290 00:14:52.800 --> 00:14:55.900 in Rhode Island. So really from Harvest to 291 00:14:55.900 --> 00:14:58.400 the lab is only two to three 292 00:14:58.400 --> 00:15:02.600 hours tops. These are really ideal conditions and the 293 00:15:01.600 --> 00:15:04.700 help was placed in these test bags 294 00:15:04.700 --> 00:15:07.200 that were held under Refrigeration for up to 295 00:15:07.200 --> 00:15:10.600 14 days. And we took daily measurements of oxygen 296 00:15:10.600 --> 00:15:13.100 carbon dioxide and then we also did some 297 00:15:13.100 --> 00:15:16.400 physical observations around those quality metrics that 298 00:15:16.400 --> 00:15:17.300 we shared earlier. 299 00:15:20.100 --> 00:15:23.700 And what we found was first of all sugar kelp 300 00:15:23.700 --> 00:15:26.400 respires that was not necessarily a thing 301 00:15:26.400 --> 00:15:30.000 that we knew we wanted to validate that turns out 302 00:15:30.400 --> 00:15:30.700 it does. 303 00:15:33.100 --> 00:15:36.900 We also learned that the longer you wait to control temperature 304 00:15:36.900 --> 00:15:39.400 and exposure to oxygen and carbon dioxide 305 00:15:39.400 --> 00:15:42.500 the higher. The respiration rate will be which tracks with 306 00:15:42.500 --> 00:15:44.700 what we know about how produce behaves. 307 00:15:45.700 --> 00:15:48.700 We also learned that mature sugar kelp exhibits 308 00:15:48.700 --> 00:15:51.600 a slightly higher respiration rate than juvenile. Kelp. 309 00:15:51.600 --> 00:15:54.200 So it has a shorter shelf life. Although that wasn't a huge 310 00:15:54.200 --> 00:15:57.200 difference. It is something to consider and then 311 00:15:57.200 --> 00:15:57.700 I think the most 312 00:15:58.800 --> 00:16:01.500 shocking thing was that if this 313 00:16:01.500 --> 00:16:04.300 sugar cup was optimally handled we found that it 314 00:16:04.300 --> 00:16:07.300 was able to survive for up to 315 00:16:07.300 --> 00:16:08.300 14 days, which 316 00:16:09.600 --> 00:16:12.600 was longer than we expected and seemed like 317 00:16:12.600 --> 00:16:15.900 a really promising finding for sugarcalp as 318 00:16:15.900 --> 00:16:16.500 a fresh product. 319 00:16:21.400 --> 00:16:24.200 So one of the things that we did with 320 00:16:24.200 --> 00:16:27.400 that information was to get up real 321 00:16:27.400 --> 00:16:31.500 quick. Oh, yeah. Go ahead. Can you okay great. Your your 322 00:16:30.500 --> 00:16:33.800 screen was showing the your application bar 323 00:16:33.800 --> 00:16:36.200 at the end. We couldn't see the whole slide but now we can oh, okay. 324 00:16:36.200 --> 00:16:37.200 Good. You're all good. 325 00:16:38.000 --> 00:16:38.300 cool 326 00:16:39.700 --> 00:16:42.200 So the the purpose of the 327 00:16:42.200 --> 00:16:45.200 respiration rate tests in addition to just kind 328 00:16:45.200 --> 00:16:48.900 of understanding better. What how does sugar kelp behave when it 329 00:16:48.900 --> 00:16:51.300 comes out of the water was to think about what could 330 00:16:51.300 --> 00:16:54.400 packaging look like for fresh sugar? Kelp if 331 00:16:54.400 --> 00:16:57.700 someone wanted to sell it in in a 332 00:16:57.700 --> 00:17:00.500 food service environment. So think of it like the ramps 333 00:17:00.500 --> 00:17:03.000 of the sea, right so we have a short period of time where we are 334 00:17:03.400 --> 00:17:06.100 harvesting this kelp comes directly out of the water. Could we get it 335 00:17:06.100 --> 00:17:09.400 to a distributor that could send it to high-end restaurants 336 00:17:09.400 --> 00:17:13.000 in New York City? Could we get it to the 337 00:17:12.200 --> 00:17:15.100 grocery store and put it on the 338 00:17:15.100 --> 00:17:19.200 Shelf next to the lettuce even if it's just a few weeks only and 339 00:17:18.200 --> 00:17:22.000 what we found was, you know, 340 00:17:21.200 --> 00:17:24.500 the fact that it lasted for 14 days under 341 00:17:24.500 --> 00:17:26.800 these really controlled conditions means that it actually 342 00:17:28.300 --> 00:17:31.300 Has potential in those applications if we were to 343 00:17:31.300 --> 00:17:34.500 package it in what's called modified atmosphere packaging or map 344 00:17:34.500 --> 00:17:37.600 and this is not vacuum packaging map 345 00:17:37.600 --> 00:17:40.300 is packaging that is designed to control the transmission of 346 00:17:40.300 --> 00:17:45.100 gases through the atmosphere by 347 00:17:43.100 --> 00:17:47.600 by basically allowing 348 00:17:46.600 --> 00:17:49.800 the atmosphere 349 00:17:49.800 --> 00:17:52.900 inside the package to come to equilibrium with the 350 00:17:52.900 --> 00:17:55.600 outside of the package through the use 351 00:17:55.600 --> 00:17:58.900 of specialized materials and small holes micro perforations. 352 00:17:58.900 --> 00:18:01.300 So eventually an equilibrium is 353 00:18:01.300 --> 00:18:04.000 reached but the inside of the package is different than the outside of the 354 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:04.400 package. 355 00:18:05.700 --> 00:18:08.400 And this controlling of 356 00:18:08.400 --> 00:18:11.400 gases lowers the respiration rate and other cellular 357 00:18:11.400 --> 00:18:14.700 processes and also creates a slightly acidic environment 358 00:18:14.700 --> 00:18:18.100 which slows down the growth of spoilage bacteria. 359 00:18:19.500 --> 00:18:22.200 And so we've had a few 360 00:18:22.200 --> 00:18:26.300 fresh who was on the call and we can ask them questions at the end. They they designed 361 00:18:25.300 --> 00:18:28.400 this packaging we came up with this packaging one 362 00:18:28.400 --> 00:18:32.000 pager which we will share with you after this call and we 363 00:18:31.100 --> 00:18:34.800 are really hoping that folks give this packaging a 364 00:18:34.800 --> 00:18:37.900 try we have both designed 365 00:18:37.900 --> 00:18:40.400 the the specific bags to use 366 00:18:40.400 --> 00:18:43.200 and then giving you some resources for where you 367 00:18:43.200 --> 00:18:46.700 can get those through through actual 368 00:18:46.700 --> 00:18:47.700 manufacturers. 369 00:18:51.800 --> 00:18:54.200 The second study that we did was on 370 00:18:54.200 --> 00:18:57.500 storage containers. So we wanted to understand more about 371 00:18:57.500 --> 00:19:00.500 this, you know, keep the kelp fluffy thing. And and why 372 00:19:00.500 --> 00:19:03.100 do we do that? And we also wanted to investigate? 373 00:19:04.500 --> 00:19:07.700 whether the sort of Industry standard practice 374 00:19:07.700 --> 00:19:10.300 of putting a large amount of kelp in a 375 00:19:10.300 --> 00:19:13.200 big sealed container is actually good for 376 00:19:13.200 --> 00:19:15.900 the kelp because it's something that everybody's doing and 377 00:19:17.200 --> 00:19:20.600 We wanted to know if it was ideal. So we took 378 00:19:20.600 --> 00:19:23.100 some sugarcalp from the East River of New York. 379 00:19:23.100 --> 00:19:26.700 We transported it to New Haven. It was 380 00:19:26.700 --> 00:19:29.000 not in refrigeration during that time. So it got a little bit of 381 00:19:29.500 --> 00:19:33.300 abuse and we put it in these three different types of containers one 382 00:19:32.300 --> 00:19:35.300 is a bulk bin, but a vented 383 00:19:35.300 --> 00:19:38.700 bulk bin and only half height the other is a small 384 00:19:38.700 --> 00:19:42.100 vented produce tote which might not 385 00:19:41.100 --> 00:19:45.100 be entirely practical for the 386 00:19:44.100 --> 00:19:47.300 large volumes of harvest. But we wanted to 387 00:19:47.300 --> 00:19:51.300 look at it from just a pure experimental 388 00:19:50.300 --> 00:19:53.100 perspective. And then we also had these 389 00:19:53.100 --> 00:19:56.500 55 gallon poly drums, which we totally sealed up 390 00:19:56.500 --> 00:19:59.500 except for a small hole in the top through which 391 00:19:59.500 --> 00:20:00.900 we could measure gases. 392 00:20:02.500 --> 00:20:05.800 And so we put kelp into these different types of containers. We 393 00:20:05.800 --> 00:20:08.500 store them for seven days and we took measurements throughout that 394 00:20:08.500 --> 00:20:08.700 time. 395 00:20:12.600 --> 00:20:16.600 What we found in this study is that the 396 00:20:15.600 --> 00:20:18.500 large in the 397 00:20:18.500 --> 00:20:21.300 in the barrels the kelp stayed moist but it 398 00:20:21.300 --> 00:20:25.100 didn't cool properly and more importantly it reached 399 00:20:24.100 --> 00:20:27.200 near anaerobic conditions and by that 400 00:20:27.200 --> 00:20:31.300 we mean that the kelp remember we just talked about with needing oxygen 401 00:20:30.300 --> 00:20:33.800 in order to keep that respiration rate going essentially 402 00:20:33.800 --> 00:20:36.300 the kelp used up almost all of the 403 00:20:36.300 --> 00:20:39.000 oxygen in those barrels and at the 404 00:20:39.200 --> 00:20:42.900 end of the seven days when we opened it the kelp was audibly bubbling. It 405 00:20:42.900 --> 00:20:45.800 smelled acidic it looked great actually, but it 406 00:20:45.800 --> 00:20:47.300 was clearly fermenting. 407 00:20:48.900 --> 00:20:52.600 The large bins what 408 00:20:51.600 --> 00:20:54.400 we found was there were no 409 00:20:54.400 --> 00:20:57.100 fermentation occurred because the the kelp had plenty 410 00:20:57.100 --> 00:21:00.500 of access to oxygen so it did not start to ferment but 411 00:21:00.500 --> 00:21:03.600 it actually retained or maybe even generated heat 412 00:21:03.600 --> 00:21:06.200 in the center of the bin. So this was even 413 00:21:06.200 --> 00:21:09.100 a half height size bulk bin 414 00:21:09.100 --> 00:21:12.500 and yet there was heat in the middle possibly because the 415 00:21:12.500 --> 00:21:15.600 kelp was cutting off oxygen to 416 00:21:15.600 --> 00:21:18.100 itself. We don't know for sure but that's sort of 417 00:21:18.100 --> 00:21:21.800 our working hypothesis. And then in the smallest totes, 418 00:21:21.800 --> 00:21:24.400 they cooled very quickly. There were no temperature differences 419 00:21:24.400 --> 00:21:27.000 in the center of the bin between the center and the outside of 420 00:21:27.100 --> 00:21:30.400 the bin there were no off odors and there was less dryness than in those those 421 00:21:30.400 --> 00:21:32.800 big half bins or totally open on top. 422 00:21:34.100 --> 00:21:36.800 So our takeaway here was that. 423 00:21:38.700 --> 00:21:42.400 Airtight and large volume storage containers potentially jeopardized 424 00:21:41.400 --> 00:21:44.200 sugar kelp quality by cutting off 425 00:21:44.200 --> 00:21:48.200 this access to oxygen and obviously depends on you 426 00:21:47.200 --> 00:21:50.100 know, how quickly you are getting it out of 427 00:21:50.100 --> 00:21:53.400 that big bin again. It also depends on whether it's just sitting there 428 00:21:53.400 --> 00:21:56.200 or whether it is submerged in water, 429 00:21:56.200 --> 00:21:59.400 especially if there is it's submerged in 430 00:21:59.400 --> 00:22:02.100 ocean water which has oxygen dissolved in it. I think 431 00:22:02.100 --> 00:22:05.100 there are some really interesting follow-on studies that could 432 00:22:05.100 --> 00:22:06.300 be done with that but 433 00:22:07.800 --> 00:22:10.800 Um, the the behavior of the barrels said 434 00:22:10.800 --> 00:22:13.200 to us pretty loud and clear that that cutting off all 435 00:22:13.200 --> 00:22:16.200 the oxygen was not a thing we want to be doing. 436 00:22:19.900 --> 00:22:22.300 And then when we looked at how this performance of sugar 437 00:22:22.300 --> 00:22:26.000 compares to what the produce industry expects the 438 00:22:25.800 --> 00:22:28.600 most are the produce in the country has 439 00:22:28.600 --> 00:22:31.100 grown on the west coast and shipped to 440 00:22:31.100 --> 00:22:34.400 the east coast. And so we usually that 441 00:22:34.400 --> 00:22:37.700 if you're on the East Coast we're looking at 21 days from the 442 00:22:37.700 --> 00:22:40.800 time that a leafy green is harvested 443 00:22:40.800 --> 00:22:43.800 to when you you know 444 00:22:43.800 --> 00:22:46.500 the last day you could possibly buy it at 445 00:22:46.500 --> 00:22:49.100 the retail store. And so I think 446 00:22:49.100 --> 00:22:52.700 this really speaks to the regionality the 447 00:22:52.700 --> 00:22:55.200 importance of regionality here. This is 448 00:22:55.200 --> 00:22:58.600 21 days is likely not going to be feasible for 449 00:22:58.600 --> 00:23:02.200 sugar kelp. But you know from the 450 00:23:02.200 --> 00:23:05.300 respiration rate trials, we did see that the kelp was 451 00:23:05.300 --> 00:23:07.600 able to last 14 days. 452 00:23:08.500 --> 00:23:11.300 And so it is within the range of 453 00:23:11.300 --> 00:23:15.000 possible possible use in a 454 00:23:14.100 --> 00:23:17.700 kind of Market situation similar 455 00:23:17.700 --> 00:23:19.400 to produce. 456 00:23:20.200 --> 00:23:23.700 And you know this could decrease if the kelp 457 00:23:23.700 --> 00:23:26.300 is abused if it is left out if it 458 00:23:26.300 --> 00:23:31.000 is not cooled quickly, but it's 459 00:23:29.400 --> 00:23:33.000 I think it was really promising and 460 00:23:32.600 --> 00:23:35.800 encouraging to see how well sugarcult behaved 461 00:23:35.800 --> 00:23:36.500 relative to. 462 00:23:37.500 --> 00:23:39.100 What the expectations are for produce? 463 00:23:42.800 --> 00:23:46.600 Next steps so we definitely do not 464 00:23:46.600 --> 00:23:49.300 think that this work was comprehensive. And so 465 00:23:49.300 --> 00:23:52.400 we want to do some more work to determine what other factors might 466 00:23:52.400 --> 00:23:56.600 influence respiration rates and shelf life, you know 467 00:23:56.600 --> 00:24:00.000 based on the studies described. We 468 00:23:59.300 --> 00:24:02.600 think that you can extend the shelf life. 469 00:24:02.600 --> 00:24:06.000 If we really take post-harvest handling seriously, which 470 00:24:05.200 --> 00:24:08.400 would make it feasible as a fresh or Food 471 00:24:08.400 --> 00:24:11.300 Service product. So these are 472 00:24:11.300 --> 00:24:14.600 some of the other considerations that we might want to look into 473 00:24:14.600 --> 00:24:18.000 or that someone else in this call might want to look into and 474 00:24:17.400 --> 00:24:20.400 we would love to talk more 475 00:24:20.400 --> 00:24:23.300 about anyone seeking to to do 476 00:24:23.300 --> 00:24:24.400 studies like this going forward. 477 00:24:26.800 --> 00:24:29.000 We do have a few more studies planned for this 478 00:24:29.400 --> 00:24:32.800 coming year. We are going to be looking at iodine control 479 00:24:32.800 --> 00:24:35.300 assault control holding temperature and 480 00:24:35.300 --> 00:24:38.900 humidity, which we did not look at in the storage studies last 481 00:24:38.900 --> 00:24:41.700 year and also biofuel removal 482 00:24:41.700 --> 00:24:44.400 in this work is going to be funded in 483 00:24:44.400 --> 00:24:47.700 part by a safe seaweed Coalition Grant and we are working with Q fresh 484 00:24:47.700 --> 00:24:48.000 again. 485 00:24:48.800 --> 00:24:51.800 so with that let's 486 00:24:52.800 --> 00:24:53.700 do some Q&A. 487 00:24:55.900 --> 00:24:58.600 Awesome. Thanks so much Sam so 488 00:24:58.600 --> 00:25:01.800 much in there. I'm excited to unpack it Azure had 489 00:25:01.800 --> 00:25:05.700 a good question early on just from a farmer's perspective do 490 00:25:04.700 --> 00:25:07.300 your research. She asked 491 00:25:07.300 --> 00:25:10.100 bags or coats for Harvest. Do you 492 00:25:10.100 --> 00:25:13.200 have recommendations for folks who are on the boat? 493 00:25:15.800 --> 00:25:18.800 I'm sorry. Could you I don't 494 00:25:18.800 --> 00:25:20.100 I didn't quite get that. 495 00:25:21.400 --> 00:25:24.100 The question was when when farmers are harvesting. Do you 496 00:25:24.100 --> 00:25:28.500 recommend bags or totes for Harvest? Um, 497 00:25:28.500 --> 00:25:31.300 I mean, it depends on what kind of bag or what 498 00:25:31.300 --> 00:25:34.000 kind of tote I would say. Um, I think you know 499 00:25:34.400 --> 00:25:36.300 the based on what we just learned. 500 00:25:37.500 --> 00:25:41.200 the it seems that more smaller 501 00:25:40.200 --> 00:25:43.700 containers that allow the kelp 502 00:25:43.700 --> 00:25:46.400 to not Crush itself under its 503 00:25:46.400 --> 00:25:49.200 own weight, which which reduces its access 504 00:25:49.200 --> 00:25:52.200 to oxygen would be better, but you have 505 00:25:52.200 --> 00:25:55.100 to weigh that against the Practical considerations of 506 00:25:56.300 --> 00:25:59.200 You know, you are you're on a boat and you're harvesting and 507 00:25:59.200 --> 00:26:03.100 you need to do that quickly. So we don't have the answer necessarily 508 00:26:02.100 --> 00:26:05.200 in terms of the type of container that 509 00:26:05.200 --> 00:26:08.500 is best. But I think our guidance is 510 00:26:08.500 --> 00:26:11.900 to consider whether there is a slightly either smaller 511 00:26:11.900 --> 00:26:14.900 container or a way to build structure into 512 00:26:14.900 --> 00:26:17.500 the containers that you're using so that the so that 513 00:26:17.500 --> 00:26:20.200 you're not cutting off oxygen to the 514 00:26:20.200 --> 00:26:22.500 kelp that's in the center of a very large bin. 515 00:26:23.200 --> 00:26:26.100 And Jennifer Eric. I 516 00:26:26.100 --> 00:26:29.100 don't know if you want to weigh in here. I mean, I know that one thing that 517 00:26:29.100 --> 00:26:32.200 I've found really educational about working 518 00:26:32.200 --> 00:26:35.200 with Jeff. And Eric is you think about like where does all our 519 00:26:35.200 --> 00:26:38.500 lettuce come from? And so a question I would send to Jeff early on I was like, would 520 00:26:38.500 --> 00:26:41.200 you ever take lettuce like us like spinach and put 521 00:26:41.200 --> 00:26:44.500 it into a 500 pound bin and 522 00:26:44.500 --> 00:26:48.500 he was like, no you would never do that. So if 523 00:26:48.500 --> 00:26:50.800 I don't know if you have anything you can share with that. 524 00:26:51.800 --> 00:26:52.900 Yeah, I mean. 525 00:26:53.800 --> 00:26:56.800 Sam great job just kind 526 00:26:56.800 --> 00:26:59.400 of reiterating what you said you're dealing with a living 527 00:26:59.400 --> 00:27:01.200 product. It's one of the few. 528 00:27:02.700 --> 00:27:05.400 Packaging whether we're talking about bulk packaging or food service 529 00:27:05.400 --> 00:27:08.700 or retail. It's one of the few packaging applications where 530 00:27:08.700 --> 00:27:11.500 you actually have the privilege of packaging something that's 531 00:27:11.500 --> 00:27:11.900 alive. 532 00:27:12.500 --> 00:27:15.400 There's Sam said it's consuming oxygen. It's giving off 533 00:27:15.400 --> 00:27:18.100 carbon dioxide. You don't want to choke at all. 534 00:27:18.700 --> 00:27:21.400 So when you're harvesting if you 535 00:27:21.400 --> 00:27:24.400 can have those bins be vented in some way 536 00:27:24.400 --> 00:27:27.200 especially if they're going to be in those bins for a while. 537 00:27:28.200 --> 00:27:31.900 The produce industry uses those small bins 538 00:27:31.900 --> 00:27:34.400 that you saw in an earlier slide. That's 539 00:27:34.400 --> 00:27:37.400 probably not practical for the seaweed 540 00:27:37.400 --> 00:27:41.000 industry. So you're gonna need to get larger bins. But 541 00:27:40.300 --> 00:27:43.400 if they can be vented so you can allow 542 00:27:43.400 --> 00:27:46.600 oxygen to that product the longer 543 00:27:46.600 --> 00:27:49.000 it's going to last before you get it into the 544 00:27:49.400 --> 00:27:52.200 final package and the final package is doing the same 545 00:27:52.200 --> 00:27:55.400 thing. It's allowing oxygen in it's allowing 546 00:27:55.400 --> 00:27:58.400 carbon dioxide out and the transmission 547 00:27:58.400 --> 00:28:01.400 rate of those final packages is in 548 00:28:01.400 --> 00:28:05.000 concert with the physiological breathing properties 549 00:28:04.200 --> 00:28:06.100 of the produce. 550 00:28:06.700 --> 00:28:09.200 So for harvesting if you 551 00:28:09.200 --> 00:28:12.300 have to put it in big totes leave the lid 552 00:28:12.300 --> 00:28:14.300 off if you can and I realize that. 553 00:28:15.200 --> 00:28:18.400 You know, there are some Logistics here that that 554 00:28:18.400 --> 00:28:20.500 may be difficult but at the end of the day. 555 00:28:21.600 --> 00:28:24.300 You've got a live product and you have to allow it 556 00:28:24.300 --> 00:28:26.700 to breathe or it's going to go anaerobic. 557 00:28:27.300 --> 00:28:30.900 Go into what's called fermentative metabolism and you're 558 00:28:30.900 --> 00:28:33.600 going to create those off flavors and all voters. 559 00:28:35.400 --> 00:28:36.000 Thanks, Steph. 560 00:28:37.300 --> 00:28:37.600 That's awesome. 561 00:28:38.300 --> 00:28:38.800 You had just a quick. 562 00:28:39.100 --> 00:28:42.300 Follow-up. So she said for my small farm that the RPC totes could 563 00:28:42.300 --> 00:28:45.300 work, but do I need ice cubes or some other icing in 564 00:28:45.300 --> 00:28:46.300 the middle of the kelp? 565 00:28:48.300 --> 00:28:51.900 um, no, most of the guidance that 566 00:28:51.900 --> 00:28:56.000 that we've seen from from sea 567 00:28:54.100 --> 00:28:57.300 Grant states that 568 00:28:57.300 --> 00:29:00.000 you don't want the kelp to come directly into contact with 569 00:29:01.500 --> 00:29:05.200 With ice or with anything freezing because it can 570 00:29:04.200 --> 00:29:07.300 shock it and that actually isn't great for it either. 571 00:29:07.300 --> 00:29:10.200 So the ideal is that you harvest it under 572 00:29:10.200 --> 00:29:15.300 cool conditions and then you pretty quickly get it to Refrigeration. Alternatively. 573 00:29:13.300 --> 00:29:16.200 I I do know 574 00:29:16.200 --> 00:29:19.300 that there are a fair number of folks now who are harvesting the kelp 575 00:29:19.300 --> 00:29:22.500 and then submerging it back in the ocean water and 576 00:29:22.500 --> 00:29:25.400 we did not look at that. I think 577 00:29:25.400 --> 00:29:28.300 that's really interesting and also a really great way 578 00:29:28.300 --> 00:29:31.500 to both keep the kelp cool and again if 579 00:29:31.500 --> 00:29:34.200 there's if if there's oxygen dissolved in that water 580 00:29:35.100 --> 00:29:38.100 You could you know, you're releasing the weight that it could 581 00:29:38.100 --> 00:29:41.400 be that there's water flowing there. But I do want emphasize we didn't test that. So 582 00:29:41.400 --> 00:29:44.300 I think it's really promising and maybe that's why 583 00:29:44.300 --> 00:29:45.400 it seems to work for people but 584 00:29:48.200 --> 00:29:49.400 Um, yeah, that's where we are. 585 00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:50.300 awesome 586 00:29:51.700 --> 00:29:54.900 a question from boyan. It sounds 587 00:29:54.900 --> 00:29:57.500 like there are two competing interest keeping oxygen out 588 00:29:57.500 --> 00:30:00.700 of the kelp's storage environment to keep this kelp cells 589 00:30:00.700 --> 00:30:03.600 respiration rate low, but then also of waiting 590 00:30:03.600 --> 00:30:06.900 to little oxygen because this encourages anaerobic microbes 591 00:30:06.900 --> 00:30:09.400 to ferment the kill. Is there an environment that 592 00:30:09.400 --> 00:30:12.100 prevents both respiration and fermentation? 593 00:30:13.900 --> 00:30:16.100 Hi, this is Eric vandercoat from 594 00:30:16.100 --> 00:30:19.300 Q. Fresh out. I'll handle that one. Um, the short 595 00:30:19.300 --> 00:30:22.200 answer is yes. So every seaweed is going to be a little bit 596 00:30:22.200 --> 00:30:25.600 different every seaweed is going to have a different 597 00:30:25.600 --> 00:30:29.100 optimal range. Every seaweed going to have a different 598 00:30:28.100 --> 00:30:32.200 respiration rate depending on the temperature But 599 00:30:31.200 --> 00:30:35.100 ultimately it's going to also have an optimal 600 00:30:34.100 --> 00:30:37.900 range of o2 values which keeps 601 00:30:37.900 --> 00:30:40.300 it above the Anna anaerobic threshold, but 602 00:30:40.300 --> 00:30:43.400 also increases that oxygen enough 603 00:30:43.400 --> 00:30:44.800 to give you a shelf like 604 00:30:45.600 --> 00:30:48.500 And that's something that that is dependent 605 00:30:48.500 --> 00:30:51.600 on mainly temperature in the 606 00:30:51.600 --> 00:30:52.000 seaweed type. 607 00:30:55.200 --> 00:30:58.500 Awesome. Thanks, Eric. And Edie and 608 00:30:58.500 --> 00:31:01.000 Kathryn have two similar questions. They ask well, do you 609 00:31:01.200 --> 00:31:04.700 please expand on why it's best to keep kelp moist but not wet specifically 610 00:31:04.700 --> 00:31:07.400 is their reason not to store. Kelp in cold seawater 611 00:31:07.400 --> 00:31:10.400 for a short term one or two days prior to next 612 00:31:10.400 --> 00:31:13.100 stage processing and Catherine similarly asks, can you 613 00:31:13.100 --> 00:31:16.400 float a brailleur bag in a small amount of salt water in a large tote? 614 00:31:17.500 --> 00:31:20.800 Again, Eric Anika from few fresh here. You know, 615 00:31:20.800 --> 00:31:24.000 I think that comes down to controls. So if 616 00:31:23.200 --> 00:31:26.600 you're if you have standing water that 617 00:31:26.600 --> 00:31:29.300 you're trying to put this into that is 618 00:31:29.300 --> 00:31:32.200 not very well controlled. Then that's going to be kind of 619 00:31:32.200 --> 00:31:36.000 a different setup than say if you had wait, 620 00:31:35.100 --> 00:31:39.900 you know, I know of a company for example that has tanks 621 00:31:38.900 --> 00:31:41.200 near the near the ocean where 622 00:31:41.200 --> 00:31:45.300 they're actually pumping sea water from the ocean and and they're actually growing seaweed 623 00:31:44.300 --> 00:31:47.500 inside the tank now that same type 624 00:31:47.500 --> 00:31:51.100 of setup because probably be worked for freshly 625 00:31:50.100 --> 00:31:54.000 Harvest freshly harvested seaweed 626 00:31:53.100 --> 00:31:57.200 that you then put in there for, you know at the 627 00:31:56.200 --> 00:31:59.700 right temperature to it to extend that 628 00:31:59.700 --> 00:32:01.300 I don't see why that wouldn't work. 629 00:32:02.500 --> 00:32:05.300 Right, and I think the key difference there is standing water 630 00:32:05.300 --> 00:32:06.200 versus. 631 00:32:07.400 --> 00:32:10.200 Versus either the ocean which is decidedly not 632 00:32:10.200 --> 00:32:13.600 standing or or like Eric's describing 633 00:32:13.600 --> 00:32:16.600 where there's a bubbler or something that is refreshing that 634 00:32:16.600 --> 00:32:20.100 water and making sure that there are still oxygen in 635 00:32:19.100 --> 00:32:22.400 in it. But if you just let the water sit there 636 00:32:22.400 --> 00:32:25.200 whether it's fresh water or sea water you're not you're not 637 00:32:25.200 --> 00:32:26.300 going to get much out of that. 638 00:32:27.500 --> 00:32:30.400 Yeah at the end of the day you keep in 639 00:32:30.400 --> 00:32:33.700 mind. This is after you as soon as you harvest it 640 00:32:33.700 --> 00:32:36.500 you go into this respiration. So the 641 00:32:36.500 --> 00:32:40.000 the kelp is wanting to consume oxygen give 642 00:32:39.200 --> 00:32:43.100 off carbon dioxide just like we do so you've 643 00:32:42.100 --> 00:32:45.200 got to have it allow it to 644 00:32:45.200 --> 00:32:48.100 have access to that oxygen that may be 645 00:32:48.100 --> 00:32:51.500 through an active sea water or through it's you 646 00:32:51.500 --> 00:32:54.000 know in air in some kind of vented toe. You don't want 647 00:32:54.100 --> 00:32:55.500 to completely dry out. 648 00:32:56.300 --> 00:32:59.300 But you do have to be careful. You just can't dunk it 649 00:32:59.300 --> 00:33:01.200 in standing water for a long period of time. 650 00:33:01.900 --> 00:33:03.600 Because it's not going to get that oxygen. 651 00:33:06.700 --> 00:33:10.200 That's great. Thanks guys. I'm really thorough answer Steve had 652 00:33:10.200 --> 00:33:12.400 a clarifying question about the study that you did. 653 00:33:12.800 --> 00:33:15.500 Say he wanted to know how much weight was able to be put into 654 00:33:15.500 --> 00:33:17.800 the two different types of totes that you mentioned. 655 00:33:18.900 --> 00:33:22.200 Yeah, good question. We turns 656 00:33:21.200 --> 00:33:24.100 out our skills broken. So we 657 00:33:24.100 --> 00:33:27.300 unfortunately didn't get that measurement. But anecdotally I 658 00:33:27.300 --> 00:33:30.400 can tell you that the small RPC totes. 659 00:33:30.400 --> 00:33:32.700 I mean, it was really not a lot of seaweed. It was maybe 660 00:33:34.500 --> 00:33:37.800 I mean, I would say seven to ten 661 00:33:37.800 --> 00:33:41.300 pounds Max per bin and then 662 00:33:40.300 --> 00:33:43.500 the big ones were pretty substantial 663 00:33:43.500 --> 00:33:44.900 the big ones I would say were. 664 00:33:46.400 --> 00:33:49.500 I don't know if you a couple hundred pounds, maybe 665 00:33:49.500 --> 00:33:52.600 like I would say two like a hundred 200 666 00:33:52.600 --> 00:33:55.500 pounds, but I that's a guess based on. 667 00:33:56.500 --> 00:33:59.600 Me physically putting see creating for 668 00:33:59.600 --> 00:34:02.700 the containers this speaks to 669 00:34:02.700 --> 00:34:04.500 our the pilot nature of these studies. 670 00:34:07.200 --> 00:34:10.500 But I do know that when people are using the full size of those toes. 671 00:34:10.500 --> 00:34:13.500 So those were standard like pallet sized footprint and 672 00:34:13.500 --> 00:34:16.700 just a half height when people do generally do 673 00:34:16.700 --> 00:34:19.200 the the larger version. I have 674 00:34:19.200 --> 00:34:22.300 seen guidance that you will don't want to put more than 500 pounds 675 00:34:22.300 --> 00:34:25.600 in those. So it would check out that roughly half of that would be you 676 00:34:25.600 --> 00:34:26.900 know, 200 250. 677 00:34:29.600 --> 00:34:32.100 Great Tobias wants to know 678 00:34:32.100 --> 00:34:35.200 fresh. Kelp versus freeze blasted. Kelp. What 679 00:34:35.200 --> 00:34:39.100 are the benefits of the fresh stuff over the Frozen? Mmm. So 680 00:34:38.100 --> 00:34:41.700 we did not look at freezing at 681 00:34:41.700 --> 00:34:44.700 all as part of this. This study was 682 00:34:44.700 --> 00:34:48.100 really focused on Fresh. So so 683 00:34:47.100 --> 00:34:50.400 unfortunately, I can't answer the question. Sorry. 684 00:34:52.300 --> 00:34:55.200 A similar question from Angela. She is wondering do you 685 00:34:55.200 --> 00:34:58.300 think with the safe handling practices that keep the 686 00:34:58.300 --> 00:35:01.400 kelp alive and well up to 14 days that this is 687 00:35:01.400 --> 00:35:04.300 a window in which it can then be dried or is it still best 688 00:35:04.300 --> 00:35:05.800 to dry within 48 hours? 689 00:35:06.800 --> 00:35:09.700 It's always best to get it stable like properly 690 00:35:09.700 --> 00:35:11.900 stable as fast as you can for sure. 691 00:35:13.600 --> 00:35:16.600 If you can process within 48 hours do 692 00:35:16.600 --> 00:35:19.400 it that that's that's my guidance Arab Jeff 693 00:35:19.400 --> 00:35:21.900 for Eric. I don't know if you have anything to add to that. 694 00:35:23.500 --> 00:35:26.400 I would I would concur with that and and the 695 00:35:26.400 --> 00:35:29.100 one thing I can say about the I can't speak 696 00:35:29.100 --> 00:35:33.200 to cope because we didn't test it but I can speak to Fresh 697 00:35:32.200 --> 00:35:35.400 Produce versus Frozen produce and 698 00:35:35.400 --> 00:35:39.300 you do lose certain vitamin and nutrient content 699 00:35:38.300 --> 00:35:42.400 during the freezing process whether that 700 00:35:42.400 --> 00:35:45.400 translates to cope or not needs to be tested out. 701 00:35:48.300 --> 00:35:51.200 But at the end of the day the faster you can process 702 00:35:51.200 --> 00:35:52.600 it once it's harvested. 703 00:35:53.700 --> 00:35:56.200 The better off you are the longer it sits 704 00:35:56.200 --> 00:35:59.300 before you do the next step. What even 705 00:35:59.300 --> 00:35:59.600 if you're gonna 706 00:36:00.500 --> 00:36:03.400 Whether you sell it right, where do you sell it frozen whether you 707 00:36:03.400 --> 00:36:06.200 continue to to sell it fresh the sooner you 708 00:36:06.200 --> 00:36:09.200 can do that to harvest as a general rule of thumb 709 00:36:09.200 --> 00:36:10.300 the better off you are. 710 00:36:13.100 --> 00:36:13.400 awesome 711 00:36:14.300 --> 00:36:18.000 Bostock wants to know could you please share good? What 712 00:36:17.100 --> 00:36:20.800 is the best case scenario for the number of shelf 713 00:36:20.800 --> 00:36:23.300 life days if best practices are used? 714 00:36:24.400 --> 00:36:28.000 Yes, so we saw about 14 715 00:36:27.500 --> 00:36:29.700 days of shelf life. 716 00:36:31.700 --> 00:36:34.500 And I know there was some another question 717 00:36:34.500 --> 00:36:38.800 earlier that that depends on many factors. What are 718 00:36:38.800 --> 00:36:41.400 those factors? And what should people be thinking about in that 719 00:36:41.400 --> 00:36:42.300 that window? 720 00:36:43.800 --> 00:36:46.200 Yeah, so let's go 721 00:36:46.200 --> 00:36:48.600 back a little in the slides. 722 00:36:52.200 --> 00:36:53.300 Yeah, so in addition to 723 00:36:54.900 --> 00:36:57.600 oxygen access to oxygen we are 724 00:36:57.600 --> 00:36:59.700 thinking about all of these factors so 725 00:37:01.700 --> 00:37:04.500 You know, the more the the tissue is physically 726 00:37:04.500 --> 00:37:08.400 damaged that's going to affect respiration exposure to 727 00:37:08.400 --> 00:37:11.200 light. Probably just again, these are sort of 728 00:37:11.200 --> 00:37:14.200 a list that we made in collaboration with Q fresh based on what 729 00:37:14.200 --> 00:37:17.300 they know about produce. So 730 00:37:18.600 --> 00:37:21.300 Water temperatures at the time of harvest or also even 731 00:37:21.300 --> 00:37:24.700 like throughout the growing we have no idea how that affects 732 00:37:24.700 --> 00:37:27.200 the the kelp. We tried to measure that 733 00:37:27.200 --> 00:37:30.200 in our second year study by taking samples of 734 00:37:30.200 --> 00:37:33.400 the sugar kelp once every two weeks and we didn't notice a few 735 00:37:33.400 --> 00:37:36.200 huge change there but this is exactly why we need it to 736 00:37:36.200 --> 00:37:39.500 be replicated. We took help from one Farm over the course of one season, 737 00:37:39.500 --> 00:37:42.300 and yes, we took it over every two weeks. But you know, 738 00:37:42.300 --> 00:37:45.000 we would love to get more data on what that 739 00:37:45.200 --> 00:37:48.600 looks like in different locations air temperature. Obviously, we 740 00:37:48.600 --> 00:37:51.300 the Kelps coming out of the water and then it's sitting and 741 00:37:51.300 --> 00:37:54.300 in the air on your boat until you can get it someplace so 742 00:37:54.300 --> 00:37:55.100 that might impact it. 743 00:37:57.100 --> 00:38:01.300 Where the the tissue actually is from could 744 00:38:00.300 --> 00:38:01.900 affect it. 745 00:38:02.700 --> 00:38:05.300 Also, if you if you've done anything else to it, if you've watched 746 00:38:05.300 --> 00:38:09.300 it or blanched it, I think just going back to Jeff's point 747 00:38:08.300 --> 00:38:11.900 about like this is the this is alive like 748 00:38:11.900 --> 00:38:14.000 when you get oysters out of the water, it's kind of 749 00:38:14.400 --> 00:38:17.500 obvious that it's alive. But but if you think of sugar kelp 750 00:38:17.500 --> 00:38:20.100 as a thing that is still alive and you're 751 00:38:20.100 --> 00:38:23.200 trying to keep it alive for as long as possible. I think 752 00:38:23.200 --> 00:38:26.400 that's a helpful like heuristic for thinking about like is 753 00:38:26.400 --> 00:38:29.300 this thing gonna this thing that I'm doing to it is this gonna 754 00:38:29.300 --> 00:38:32.300 make it last longer or is it gonna shorten that shelf life? Just 755 00:38:32.300 --> 00:38:34.600 think about like if you had a flower or a 756 00:38:35.700 --> 00:38:38.100 Yeah, or lettuce, what would you 757 00:38:38.100 --> 00:38:38.100 do? 758 00:38:41.300 --> 00:38:45.000 Awesome. Steve has a kind of follow on to that. So he 759 00:38:44.100 --> 00:38:47.600 says that his buyer is driving down from Maine. Once he 760 00:38:47.600 --> 00:38:50.400 Harvest with a refrigerated truck and he's been trying to find a local business to 761 00:38:50.400 --> 00:38:53.300 use Refrigeration in case the truck breaks 762 00:38:53.300 --> 00:38:56.400 down or whatever. But what would the optimal temperature would farmers 763 00:38:56.400 --> 00:39:01.100 want to store their? Kelp at in that fridge also a 764 00:39:00.100 --> 00:39:02.700 great question. So right now, 765 00:39:03.800 --> 00:39:06.900 The guidance coming from from sea 766 00:39:06.900 --> 00:39:09.700 Grant is that we want to be looking at 41 degrees or 767 00:39:09.700 --> 00:39:12.200 lower and that's in part because 768 00:39:12.200 --> 00:39:15.800 of the contamination risk with with shellfish with with 769 00:39:15.800 --> 00:39:18.700 biofouling. So if you are kelp 770 00:39:18.700 --> 00:39:21.200 were to have some, you know, snail or something else 771 00:39:21.200 --> 00:39:24.800 on it, and then that is stored outside, 772 00:39:24.800 --> 00:39:27.500 you know warmer than 41 degrees that could 773 00:39:27.500 --> 00:39:30.100 potentially cause food safety issues for your product Downstream. 774 00:39:32.200 --> 00:39:35.100 If it were just up to the kelp itself without thinking about 775 00:39:35.100 --> 00:39:38.400 biophile, there might be other temperatures that are slightly warmer that 776 00:39:38.400 --> 00:39:42.100 would be better but that's not something we've tested in 777 00:39:41.100 --> 00:39:44.600 the past year studies and we are hoping to do tests 778 00:39:44.600 --> 00:39:46.000 on that this coming season. 779 00:39:47.500 --> 00:39:50.200 The other thing that I can add to get again, this is 780 00:39:50.200 --> 00:39:51.700 this it's not killed. 781 00:39:52.500 --> 00:39:55.300 But it's possible that people will start looking 782 00:39:55.300 --> 00:39:57.700 at tilt more like leafy green products. 783 00:39:58.400 --> 00:40:01.800 By law leafy greens have to be kept below 41 784 00:40:01.800 --> 00:40:04.800 and a half degrees Fahrenheit. Okay from a 785 00:40:04.800 --> 00:40:07.500 food safety standpoint. So that hasn't and that's 786 00:40:07.500 --> 00:40:11.200 an FDA regulation that hasn't translated just 787 00:40:10.200 --> 00:40:13.300 seaweed yet, but you could 788 00:40:13.300 --> 00:40:16.200 see where people would sort of look at it like that. So I 789 00:40:16.200 --> 00:40:19.100 think that 41 41 and a half good number. 790 00:40:23.500 --> 00:40:26.300 We have to interesting question after Cooling and he said were 791 00:40:26.300 --> 00:40:29.500 any Harvest handling processing methods looked at which explicitly avoid 792 00:40:29.500 --> 00:40:32.800 cooling the kelp unfortunately, the lca's our 793 00:40:32.800 --> 00:40:35.500 lifecycle analyzes out there today show that cooling indoor 794 00:40:35.500 --> 00:40:38.500 icing the kelp effectively completely and does the climate benefit of 795 00:40:38.500 --> 00:40:41.300 growing it IE the cooling process even for a fairly 796 00:40:41.300 --> 00:40:44.500 short time emits more greenhouse gases than the kelpkin sequester 797 00:40:44.500 --> 00:40:45.400 during its whole lifetime. 798 00:40:46.600 --> 00:40:49.100 Eric I saw you responded to that one in the chat 799 00:40:49.100 --> 00:40:50.600 you want to chime in? 800 00:40:51.700 --> 00:40:54.100 Yeah, I briefly answered that. Um, this is 801 00:40:54.100 --> 00:40:57.400 this was not part of this study, but I have looked at um, 802 00:40:57.400 --> 00:41:00.900 and it also wasn't sugar. Kelp. It was it was I 803 00:41:00.900 --> 00:41:03.500 can't remember off top my head was either. Oh go go or 804 00:41:03.500 --> 00:41:06.400 dose and we looked at various 805 00:41:06.400 --> 00:41:09.200 temperatures. So at the time we didn't know, you know, 806 00:41:09.200 --> 00:41:12.100 whether cold or hot or warmer, and we wanted 807 00:41:12.100 --> 00:41:13.700 to look at the effects so we actually did test. 808 00:41:14.700 --> 00:41:17.700 36 42 50 and 809 00:41:17.700 --> 00:41:22.100 62, I believe in that test that I did and essentially, you 810 00:41:20.100 --> 00:41:23.400 know, the higher the temperature you go 811 00:41:23.400 --> 00:41:26.400 the more shelf life you lose in the the effects can 812 00:41:26.400 --> 00:41:29.500 be quite drastic. So the difference between 36 degrees 813 00:41:29.500 --> 00:41:32.400 storage and 62 degree storage was about 814 00:41:32.400 --> 00:41:35.400 10 days. So we got closer to 13 14 days at 815 00:41:35.400 --> 00:41:38.200 that colder temperature and once you kept it 816 00:41:38.200 --> 00:41:42.300 at 62 a lot of it was micro-driven and 817 00:41:41.300 --> 00:41:44.400 off odor driven and that product 818 00:41:44.400 --> 00:41:47.400 went bad much earlier three four five days post 819 00:41:47.400 --> 00:41:47.900 Harvest. 820 00:41:52.900 --> 00:41:55.600 With them the greatest 821 00:41:55.600 --> 00:41:58.700 I saw that you answered this but there have been a couple questions about the 822 00:41:58.700 --> 00:42:01.600 if we could all expand on the map packaging 823 00:42:01.600 --> 00:42:04.300 and what recommended for what 824 00:42:04.300 --> 00:42:06.700 type of product is this fresh dried or Frozen. 825 00:42:11.500 --> 00:42:12.200 Yeah, if you want to handle that. 826 00:42:15.400 --> 00:42:18.400 Sorry, I was just gonna say that that it is designed for fresh. 827 00:42:18.400 --> 00:42:21.400 We did not look at it with 828 00:42:21.400 --> 00:42:24.300 frozen or dried because 829 00:42:24.300 --> 00:42:27.100 at that point your kelp is no longer breathing in those other 830 00:42:27.100 --> 00:42:30.500 situations. And so the idea of the the 831 00:42:30.500 --> 00:42:33.200 concept with this packaging is that there are 832 00:42:33.200 --> 00:42:36.600 there is a material that the packaging is 833 00:42:36.600 --> 00:42:39.300 made out of which was selected specifically for sugar 834 00:42:39.300 --> 00:42:42.700 kelp, but then there's all these perforations so like literal actual holes. 835 00:42:42.700 --> 00:42:45.100 And if you go to the next time you go to the grocery store, if you 836 00:42:45.100 --> 00:42:48.500 look in your prepare in your packaged produce section, 837 00:42:48.500 --> 00:42:52.000 look for the holes, like you'll notice that depending on 838 00:42:51.300 --> 00:42:54.300 what type of product is there. There are 839 00:42:54.300 --> 00:42:57.400 different sizes of holes in the packaging. And so those holes 840 00:42:57.400 --> 00:43:00.300 are intended to let the let the 841 00:43:00.300 --> 00:43:04.200 kelp breathe at the rate that is ideal 842 00:43:03.200 --> 00:43:04.900 for it to 843 00:43:06.300 --> 00:43:09.500 stay alive, but not use up 844 00:43:09.500 --> 00:43:10.700 all its glucose too fast. 845 00:43:11.900 --> 00:43:14.200 Just absolutely and this is where it can 846 00:43:14.200 --> 00:43:17.600 get a little confusing because there's two definitions 847 00:43:17.600 --> 00:43:20.600 of modified atmosphere packaging and it depends 848 00:43:20.600 --> 00:43:22.500 on the product that your Packaging. 849 00:43:23.300 --> 00:43:26.400 If your packaging a dried product or 850 00:43:26.400 --> 00:43:31.300 for instance in the meat industry or in the 851 00:43:30.300 --> 00:43:33.100 cheese industry and a lot of other 852 00:43:33.100 --> 00:43:36.800 more shell stable products modified atmosphere packaging means 853 00:43:36.800 --> 00:43:39.700 you get all of the oxygen out you pack 854 00:43:39.700 --> 00:43:42.700 it in a barrier package and you keep the oxygen out. 855 00:43:43.400 --> 00:43:47.300 Modified atmosphere packaging for fresh produce which 856 00:43:46.300 --> 00:43:49.700 seaweed falls under the kelp 857 00:43:49.700 --> 00:43:52.700 falls under is a modified atmosphere 858 00:43:52.700 --> 00:43:55.200 packaging that you're bringing the 859 00:43:55.200 --> 00:43:58.300 oxygen level down, but you're not bringing it down 860 00:43:58.300 --> 00:43:58.900 to zero. 861 00:43:59.800 --> 00:44:02.300 So you have to be a little bit careful when you're 862 00:44:02.300 --> 00:44:05.200 talking about modified atmosphere packaging. I mean, 863 00:44:05.200 --> 00:44:08.600 the scientific definition of modified atmosphere packaging 864 00:44:08.600 --> 00:44:11.800 is anything inside the package that is 865 00:44:11.800 --> 00:44:14.900 not 21.7% oxygen 300 866 00:44:14.900 --> 00:44:17.300 parts per million carbon, dioxide and 867 00:44:17.300 --> 00:44:20.800 72.8% everything else if you 868 00:44:20.800 --> 00:44:23.800 have something other than that, which is air 869 00:44:23.800 --> 00:44:26.600 if you have something other than that inside your 870 00:44:26.600 --> 00:44:29.300 pocket package by definition, you have a modified 871 00:44:29.300 --> 00:44:30.400 atmosphere package. 872 00:44:30.900 --> 00:44:34.500 Modified atmosphere packaging for cheese 873 00:44:33.500 --> 00:44:36.700 and meat and even certain 874 00:44:36.700 --> 00:44:40.200 fish and shellfish is significantly different 875 00:44:39.200 --> 00:44:42.700 than modified atmosphere packaging 876 00:44:42.700 --> 00:44:45.500 for produce the kelp project 877 00:44:45.500 --> 00:44:49.800 and the slide that you see up there is specifically 878 00:44:48.800 --> 00:44:51.700 modified atmosphere packaging 879 00:44:51.700 --> 00:44:54.600 for something that's living and breathing 880 00:44:54.600 --> 00:44:56.900 and would be more produce light. 881 00:44:58.500 --> 00:44:59.500 If that clarifies it. 882 00:45:00.300 --> 00:45:03.400 And yeah, and I'd one more thing to that which is that we were trying 883 00:45:03.400 --> 00:45:04.300 to be really careful. 884 00:45:06.500 --> 00:45:09.800 to make this packaging fall 885 00:45:09.800 --> 00:45:10.300 under 886 00:45:11.300 --> 00:45:13.200 a farm activity and 887 00:45:19.700 --> 00:45:20.400 We just lost. 888 00:45:21.500 --> 00:45:24.300 I'm sure she was working on coming back in but in the meantime, I'll 889 00:45:24.300 --> 00:45:27.100 skip over and maybe Jeff or Eric. You can 890 00:45:27.100 --> 00:45:31.000 answer does the map packaging is it typically petro-based or 891 00:45:30.300 --> 00:45:31.900 based from Plastics? 892 00:45:33.200 --> 00:45:36.700 So traditionally if you look at modified atmosphere packaging for 893 00:45:36.700 --> 00:45:38.200 fresh produce when it started. 894 00:45:38.900 --> 00:45:41.500 Really really strongly in the late 80s. 895 00:45:41.500 --> 00:45:44.900 It was all conventional petroleum based that 896 00:45:44.900 --> 00:45:47.200 is changed now still quite a 897 00:45:47.200 --> 00:45:51.600 bit of it is globally but there's also biopolymers. 898 00:45:50.600 --> 00:45:54.200 There's also some 899 00:45:53.200 --> 00:45:56.400 non-plat, you know, so by a 900 00:45:56.400 --> 00:45:59.800 polymer is like a pla or PBA and 901 00:45:59.800 --> 00:46:03.000 there's a whole bunch of different ones that are Plastics that 902 00:46:02.400 --> 00:46:05.900 are made from biological products. 903 00:46:05.900 --> 00:46:08.600 The one that everybody knows and everybody uses 904 00:46:08.600 --> 00:46:11.700 every day, but doesn't really realize it's a biopolymer 905 00:46:11.700 --> 00:46:12.900 is cellophane. 906 00:46:13.400 --> 00:46:17.000 Cellophane is made from wood. So technically it 907 00:46:16.200 --> 00:46:20.000 is a biopolymer and it's one of the oldest Plastics 908 00:46:19.200 --> 00:46:22.700 in the world. So and and there 909 00:46:22.700 --> 00:46:25.600 even fiber options now the gas 910 00:46:25.600 --> 00:46:28.900 which is sugar cane husks. So they're 911 00:46:28.900 --> 00:46:31.400 a lot more options available now and there's more 912 00:46:31.400 --> 00:46:35.000 coming on almost every day that it 913 00:46:34.200 --> 00:46:37.100 does not necessarily mean it has to 914 00:46:37.100 --> 00:46:40.100 be a conventional petroleum based polymer. 915 00:46:42.500 --> 00:46:44.000 Great grateful up. Thank you for that. 916 00:46:45.300 --> 00:46:49.000 And I saw that this question was Eric you you got to Bowen's 917 00:46:48.100 --> 00:46:51.200 question, but I thought it was worth repeating for 918 00:46:51.200 --> 00:46:54.200 the group just because I think it makes a good point how bad for the 919 00:46:54.200 --> 00:46:57.900 quality would it be to have the kelp and a highly oxygen constrained environment 920 00:46:57.900 --> 00:47:00.700 for a short span of time while harvesting 921 00:47:00.700 --> 00:47:03.800 so 30 to 60 minutes and then get it back into 922 00:47:03.800 --> 00:47:07.300 an oxygenated environment for further processing Eric. 923 00:47:06.300 --> 00:47:09.100 Did you want to repeat that answer? 924 00:47:12.200 --> 00:47:15.900 Um, yeah, hold on the second. That's one 925 00:47:15.900 --> 00:47:16.400 of the answer, right? 926 00:47:17.900 --> 00:47:20.400 Yeah, you said it takes time for the O2 to change short periods. 927 00:47:20.400 --> 00:47:23.700 Should not have okay. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I 928 00:47:23.700 --> 00:47:26.500 mean short-term periods. So changing out 929 00:47:26.500 --> 00:47:29.900 to inside of a container is not a really rapid 930 00:47:29.900 --> 00:47:32.600 process. It takes most times 931 00:47:32.600 --> 00:47:35.200 kind of depending on the volume of the container. They were not 932 00:47:35.200 --> 00:47:39.700 a product the respiration rate of the product to take somewhere between you 933 00:47:38.700 --> 00:47:41.600 know, three and five days to reach 934 00:47:41.600 --> 00:47:44.600 me delivery. So putting something like that in 935 00:47:44.600 --> 00:47:47.600 a constrained environment for very short period of time would start 936 00:47:47.600 --> 00:47:50.400 to change the O2 but it wouldn't change it very 937 00:47:50.400 --> 00:47:51.700 much if I go from say 938 00:47:52.600 --> 00:47:55.300 21% that we're breathing right now to maybe 939 00:47:55.300 --> 00:47:58.400 18 19 percent so you can actually even push it 940 00:47:58.400 --> 00:48:01.100 a little bit further if you wanted to and especially if 941 00:48:01.100 --> 00:48:05.300 you're monitoring that using a an O2 CO2 headspace 942 00:48:04.300 --> 00:48:07.300 monitor, that'd be one way to assure 943 00:48:07.300 --> 00:48:09.100 that but it should be absolutely no problem. 944 00:48:10.800 --> 00:48:13.000 That's interesting. Is that that kind of opens up 945 00:48:13.300 --> 00:48:15.300 more possibilities for the farmer on the boat right there? 946 00:48:17.200 --> 00:48:20.300 Were these options might be a little bit more constrained? Yeah, the what 947 00:48:20.300 --> 00:48:23.700 we found is the bigger for those short periods 948 00:48:23.700 --> 00:48:26.400 of time when you're putting it into kind of 949 00:48:26.400 --> 00:48:29.500 an overloaded bin. It is temperature and 950 00:48:29.500 --> 00:48:32.200 heat load. So once you pull it from the water, 951 00:48:32.200 --> 00:48:35.300 then you're looking at well, what's the 952 00:48:35.300 --> 00:48:38.300 ambient temperature? And how long is it stored directly in the Sun and 953 00:48:38.300 --> 00:48:41.300 in some of those factors which can boost the heat inside of 954 00:48:41.300 --> 00:48:44.700 the system which can have kind of more drastic effects 955 00:48:44.700 --> 00:48:47.100 than just simply changing the O2 and those early 956 00:48:47.100 --> 00:48:47.400 stages. 957 00:48:50.100 --> 00:48:50.400 Great. 958 00:48:51.300 --> 00:48:54.700 I'm standing there have been a couple questions. Krista asked 959 00:48:54.700 --> 00:48:57.300 a question about if this study looked at the effects 960 00:48:57.300 --> 00:49:00.700 of a freshwater rinse, which we know that it didn't necessarily 961 00:49:00.700 --> 00:49:03.300 but can you speak there were kind of follow-up questions on that 962 00:49:03.300 --> 00:49:06.300 in terms of would a freshwater rinse cause 963 00:49:06.300 --> 00:49:10.900 blistering to the kelp what would implications of that be and interest? 964 00:49:09.900 --> 00:49:12.100 Yeah interested if you want to 965 00:49:12.100 --> 00:49:12.400 comment on that. 966 00:49:13.500 --> 00:49:16.200 Yeah, and I thought thank you Michael for jumping in on 967 00:49:16.200 --> 00:49:19.800 that one. The advice right now 968 00:49:19.800 --> 00:49:22.400 is to not rinse the 969 00:49:22.400 --> 00:49:25.300 kelp in freshwater and different help has different 970 00:49:25.300 --> 00:49:28.300 reactions to this. But but in general it is not 971 00:49:28.300 --> 00:49:32.200 good to rinse with fresh water. If some folks 972 00:49:31.200 --> 00:49:34.300 who are blanching they are blanching 973 00:49:34.300 --> 00:49:37.400 with fresh water, but the blanches already changing 974 00:49:37.400 --> 00:49:40.500 so much about the kelp that it's not it's not Apples 975 00:49:40.500 --> 00:49:43.500 to Apples. So yeah in general you want to actually protect 976 00:49:43.500 --> 00:49:46.500 your kelp from fresh water. So you you wouldn't even ideally want 977 00:49:46.500 --> 00:49:49.300 to harvest in the rain and you would want to cover your 978 00:49:49.300 --> 00:49:52.500 kelp to make sure it doesn't get splashed with with any fresh 979 00:49:52.500 --> 00:49:52.700 water. 980 00:49:54.500 --> 00:49:58.600 And sort of going off that I know that in recent conversations 981 00:49:57.600 --> 00:50:01.200 Sam you have recommended folks do 982 00:50:00.200 --> 00:50:03.400 use a blanching method to 983 00:50:03.400 --> 00:50:06.500 reduce the iodine content and kelp so can you 984 00:50:06.500 --> 00:50:09.200 speak to the iodine content of fresh kelp and and any of 985 00:50:09.200 --> 00:50:11.000 these practices do they impact that at all? 986 00:50:12.300 --> 00:50:15.700 Yeah, so the practice is the storage and post-service 987 00:50:15.700 --> 00:50:18.500 handling things that we studied with with just like 988 00:50:18.500 --> 00:50:21.500 holding it in different conditions. Those should not have any effect 989 00:50:21.500 --> 00:50:24.300 on iodine at all. We would not expect them to at least. 990 00:50:25.500 --> 00:50:27.700 That being said we didn't look at it. So we don't know for sure. 991 00:50:29.700 --> 00:50:33.000 There is a great paper out there very thorough 992 00:50:32.400 --> 00:50:36.300 on blanching to reduce and 993 00:50:35.300 --> 00:50:39.400 control iodine that showed that blanching sugar. 994 00:50:39.400 --> 00:50:42.300 Kelp pretty reliably brings it down to 12% of 995 00:50:42.300 --> 00:50:45.300 what the what it is normally and that's 996 00:50:45.300 --> 00:50:48.200 great news because yeah Brown macro algae 997 00:50:48.200 --> 00:50:51.300 does have really high levels of iodine and that is a concern. 998 00:50:52.400 --> 00:50:55.400 Among Regulators about whether you know 999 00:50:55.400 --> 00:50:58.200 consumption of it and and how how we 1000 00:50:58.200 --> 00:51:02.400 can make sure it's safe for people to eat. So obviously seaweeds have 1001 00:51:02.400 --> 00:51:02.800 been a part of 1002 00:51:03.700 --> 00:51:06.000 various cultures diets for 1003 00:51:06.400 --> 00:51:10.200 thousands and thousands of years and we live in 2023 in 1004 00:51:10.200 --> 00:51:13.600 the United States of America. And so there are regulations that we 1005 00:51:13.600 --> 00:51:16.100 need to be aware of and and kind of 1006 00:51:17.400 --> 00:51:19.100 develop processes to address 1007 00:51:22.900 --> 00:51:25.100 Thank you. We are coming up to the top of the hours. I 1008 00:51:25.100 --> 00:51:28.300 think. Oh, maybe one or two more questions some of these the 1009 00:51:28.300 --> 00:51:31.200 remaining questions have to do more with sort of 1010 00:51:31.200 --> 00:51:34.100 the composition of kelp than necessarily. The poster is handling. 1011 00:51:34.100 --> 00:51:37.500 But Brandon asks speaking of testing. Does anyone 1012 00:51:37.500 --> 00:51:40.700 have a COA with mineral protein and amino counts 1013 00:51:40.700 --> 00:51:43.100 in the kelp when harvested and then about 10 days later 1014 00:51:43.100 --> 00:51:46.400 on another COA to have some idea of measurement 1015 00:51:46.400 --> 00:51:47.500 of degradation. 1016 00:51:50.400 --> 00:51:52.400 We did not do that. We did not look at that. 1017 00:51:53.800 --> 00:51:56.400 I don't know. I mean again, I don't know how useful it 1018 00:51:56.400 --> 00:51:59.400 is if you guys are interested in the produce perspective. I'm sure Jeff and Eric 1019 00:51:59.400 --> 00:52:02.900 know a bit about how nutrients degrade over time. I I 1020 00:52:02.900 --> 00:52:05.900 think you know, it's not a direct we can't 1021 00:52:05.900 --> 00:52:08.200 necessarily assume that everything that happens in produce 1022 00:52:08.200 --> 00:52:11.300 happens in sugarcult, but I think it can help to understand 1023 00:52:11.300 --> 00:52:12.000 what 1024 00:52:12.800 --> 00:52:15.200 happens in other products so that we can look to see 1025 00:52:15.200 --> 00:52:17.000 if they happen in sugarcope as well. 1026 00:52:17.900 --> 00:52:18.700 Jeff go ahead. 1027 00:52:19.800 --> 00:52:23.300 So there is a degradation the 1028 00:52:22.300 --> 00:52:26.100 longer you and again, I think it's very 1029 00:52:25.100 --> 00:52:28.800 important to reiterate this. What I'm going to about to 1030 00:52:28.800 --> 00:52:31.900 talk about is fresh produce. There is not necessarily 1031 00:52:31.900 --> 00:52:34.800 a direct relationship to go. 1032 00:52:34.800 --> 00:52:37.800 We haven't tested that so we don't know there 1033 00:52:37.800 --> 00:52:40.800 is at around fresh produce. 1034 00:52:40.800 --> 00:52:42.200 It's produce dependent. 1035 00:52:42.900 --> 00:52:45.400 That the produce does 1036 00:52:45.400 --> 00:52:48.200 degrade over time the nutrient level and 1037 00:52:48.200 --> 00:52:48.700 whatnot. 1038 00:52:49.500 --> 00:52:51.400 but the general feeling was 1039 00:52:52.600 --> 00:52:55.500 even at that degraded level at the 1040 00:52:55.500 --> 00:52:58.800 very tale into shelf life. You're still 1041 00:52:58.800 --> 00:53:01.500 getting more health benefits from eating the produce 1042 00:53:01.500 --> 00:53:02.600 than not eating it. 1043 00:53:03.300 --> 00:53:06.700 So if if a fresh and again, I'm speaking fresh 1044 00:53:06.700 --> 00:53:07.400 cut produce. 1045 00:53:07.900 --> 00:53:10.300 If a fresh cut produce in a 1046 00:53:10.300 --> 00:53:13.400 bag is going to or tray is going 1047 00:53:13.400 --> 00:53:15.800 to cause you to eat more leafy greens. 1048 00:53:16.900 --> 00:53:19.600 Keep doing it because it's better than not eating 1049 00:53:19.600 --> 00:53:23.100 them at all. Is there a slight degradation dependent 1050 00:53:22.100 --> 00:53:24.500 upon product? Yes, there is. 1051 00:53:27.800 --> 00:53:30.800 Very similarly related question to that 1052 00:53:30.800 --> 00:53:33.200 Jeff. Was that Derek wanted to know how much of 1053 00:53:33.200 --> 00:53:36.300 the nutrient value would be lost with drying or powdering the 1054 00:53:36.300 --> 00:53:39.000 kelp even if it's used very shortly thereafter. 1055 00:53:41.700 --> 00:53:44.200 I'm not I'm not equipped to 1056 00:53:44.200 --> 00:53:47.600 answer that. I know that there is a reduction in produce 1057 00:53:47.600 --> 00:53:50.500 as well. But I'm 1058 00:53:50.500 --> 00:53:54.100 Eric. Maybe you are but I'm not qualified to 1059 00:53:53.100 --> 00:53:54.500 answer that question. 1060 00:54:01.400 --> 00:54:03.500 Something none of us are qualified together. 1061 00:54:05.400 --> 00:54:08.200 We have one more question in the queue. And so let's let's 1062 00:54:08.200 --> 00:54:11.300 try and hit it boy and asks, has 1063 00:54:11.300 --> 00:54:14.300 anyone looked at high nitrogen modified atmosphere inside the package 1064 00:54:14.300 --> 00:54:16.300 with the kelp to extend shelf life. 1065 00:54:17.200 --> 00:54:20.300 We did not look at that because again the goal. 1066 00:54:20.300 --> 00:54:24.200 This is what I was saying when I when my computer cut out the goal 1067 00:54:23.200 --> 00:54:26.800 was really to design a packaging that was 1068 00:54:26.800 --> 00:54:29.300 very minimal in terms of the requirements for 1069 00:54:29.300 --> 00:54:33.200 the farmer. We wanted anyone to be able to like all 1070 00:54:32.200 --> 00:54:35.300 we all you have to buy to make this 1071 00:54:35.300 --> 00:54:38.300 modified Atmos packaging work is you need 1072 00:54:38.300 --> 00:54:41.200 to buy the bags and you need to seal it somehow with it with a 1073 00:54:41.200 --> 00:54:44.500 heat sealer and we had three different options that kind of like the most 1074 00:54:44.500 --> 00:54:47.700 basic hand operated model all the way up to a processing 1075 00:54:47.700 --> 00:54:50.500 line. So if you were to introduce nitrogen to 1076 00:54:50.500 --> 00:54:54.200 that, then you are definitely entering processing territory. And 1077 00:54:53.200 --> 00:54:56.300 that is probably not then then you 1078 00:54:56.300 --> 00:54:59.600 get into needing to have a food safe, you know 1079 00:54:59.600 --> 00:55:02.000 as a certified facility and all kinds of 1080 00:55:02.200 --> 00:55:06.500 other stuff. So we were really looking for something that we thought might qualify 1081 00:55:05.500 --> 00:55:09.300 as an on-farm activity essentially, 1082 00:55:08.300 --> 00:55:11.000 so no we did not look at that. 1083 00:55:13.300 --> 00:55:16.100 Awesome. Thanks Sam. All right, we are at the 1084 00:55:16.100 --> 00:55:19.500 top Tower. So I'm gonna close us off. I do want to just quickly put 1085 00:55:19.500 --> 00:55:22.600 in a plug for the next upcoming farmer Forum 1086 00:55:22.600 --> 00:55:25.500 conversations. We have you can now sign up for these at 1087 00:55:25.500 --> 00:55:28.500 any time on the Hub. If you log into your the greenway 1088 00:55:28.500 --> 00:55:32.100 hub.greenwave.org and greenway.org/hub, sorry, 1089 00:55:31.100 --> 00:55:34.400 and there's an events 1090 00:55:34.400 --> 00:55:37.600 Tab and the upcoming conversation we have on February 1091 00:55:37.600 --> 00:55:40.400 1st is will be about the upgrades that green Vape 1092 00:55:40.400 --> 00:55:43.800 has recently made to its kelp Nursery system and sort of 1093 00:55:43.800 --> 00:55:46.600 adaptations to infrastructure and Technology across the 1094 00:55:46.600 --> 00:55:49.300 kilpatrice system more generally and then 1095 00:55:49.300 --> 00:55:52.900 February 9th will be back with the same Market development crew that 1096 00:55:52.900 --> 00:55:55.300 you know love and who will be joined by 1097 00:55:55.300 --> 00:55:58.800 Courtney White Myers at akua to talk about co-packing with 1098 00:55:58.800 --> 00:56:01.600 help. So if either of those conversations interest 1099 00:56:01.600 --> 00:56:04.600 you please sign up on the Hub and we look forward to seeing 1100 00:56:04.600 --> 00:56:07.200 you there and thank you all for such really great 1101 00:56:07.200 --> 00:56:10.400 questions and discussion that's was fantastic and a big thanks to 1102 00:56:10.400 --> 00:56:12.200 you fresh for joining us today. 1103 00:56:17.500 --> 00:56:19.600 Awesome. Have a great week everyone.