Red Tide Mitigation and Technology Development Initiative

Red tide harmful algal blooms, are a higher-than-normal concentration of microscopic alga that occur in ocean and coastal waters.  These blooms can harmfully affect sea life, lead to fish kills, cause human respiratory problems, close beaches, and determinately impact shellfish, fishing, hotel, restaurant, recreational, and tourism industries. The Florida Red Tide Mitigation and Technology Development Initiative is a partnership between Mote Marine Laboratory and the State of Florida that establishes an independent and coordinated effort among public and private research entities to develop control and mitigation technologies that will decrease the impacts of Florida red tide on the environment, economy and quality of life in Florida. Initiative funding has allowed Mote to expand the testing of mitigation tools and technologies to find those that kill the algae, minimize the impact of the Karenia brevis toxin, and have no further human health or ecological harm. Mote and it’s 30+ partners have examined over 300 compounds/technologies and more than 35 projects have been completed or are underway.  Funded projects follow a tiered testing approach—peer reviewed published literature and/ or lab based (tier 1), mesocosms/raceways (tier 2), and nearshore field sites (tier 3). All funded projects have completed tier 1 testing, most have completed tier 2 or are tweaking previous tank testing, several are in-water or ready to move into field testing (tier 3) and pursuing regulatory approvals and examining commercialization options (tier 4).

Primary Presenter: Kevin Claridge, Mote Marine Laboratory (kclaridge@mote.org)

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