BT Young Scientist Competition - Can Clonakilty Bay clean itself and also reduce methane emissions from cattle?

Below is a summary of the second SHSS project competing in this year’s BT Young Scientist Competition.

Can Clonakilty Bay clean itself and also reduce Methane emissions from cattle?

By: Sinéad O’Mahony, Grace Murphy and Éabha Egan

What we wanted to find out:

Our aim was to prove that water from Clonakilty bay can be used to grow asparagopsis armata, which would help reduce methane emissions. We also aimed  to prove that by growing Asparagopsis armata in Clonakilty bay water, the levels of phosphates and nitrates in the bay water will decrease. In doing this, there would be a reduction of sea lettuce in the bay.

How did we do this?

We took weekly samples of sea water from a number of locations across the bay, from the bay itself, from “Ring” and “Inchydoney”. 

A control sample experiment was established for “asparagopsis armata“ using boiled spring water, with both “salts” and “nutrients” supplied by NUIG. 

A second control without any seaweed was established to expose the Sea water to the same conditions as those to which the seaweed experiments were run. We took samples of the water from the experiment every week.  We gave these water samples to MTU and they detected the phosphate and nitrate levels using Raman spectroscopy.  

What we found:

We had an increase in mass with two of our experiments. The data indicates that Clonakilty bay sea water can be used to grow Asparagopsis armata.

However this cannot be readily achieved by using the water itself without changing out the water frequently.

Looking at the rate of growth data we have seen in our experiments at the scale we are doing them, it is unlikely that by using Clonakilty bay seawater alone (even with nutrients added) that we would be able to generate the amount of dry Asparagopsis armata needed to feed the local cattle herd and to achieve anything approaching the levels of Methane reductions needed.  

What we plan to do 

With that being said we are going to continue our experiment as we believe it may be more effective in the coming warmer months and seasons of spring and summer. This approaching time period will lead to an increase in farming which may increase the level of phosphate and nitrates in the bay and therefore our experiment may return with different results.

We are also planning to introduce a new water sample from the River Feagle, running through Ring and we hope that this may prove to be successful.

Well done, girls! Thanks to Ms Holland.