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About TESSA
Researchers from GMIT's Research for Alternative Culture Enterprises (RACE) Group recognised that the energy cost has long been a key constraint to growth in the aquaculture sector and have teamed up with GMIT colleagues from the Sustainable Energy Research Group (SERG) in 2006 to help address this issue.
Both groups sought to establish lower-cost "Total Energy Solutions for Sustainable Aquaculture" (TESSA) and a three-year project started in June 2007.
The key aims are to establish a profile for the year-round energy-consumption in Irish based aquaculture farms and then use this information to investigate alternative means of meeting energy requirements.
This would be achieved by using a combination of sustainable energy technnologies (energy supply) and energy efficiency measures (energy reduction). The research combines desk study, site visits nationally and internationally, and the construction and operation of a demonstrator facility and system simulation at GMIT.
Since this project has been developed to support the entire aquaculture industry in Ireland, the project team established a cross sectoral Steering group to advise on the research direction and scope. The members are Bill Carty, Cool Springs Arctica Charr ltd; Ken Maher, MRI Carna; Joe McElwee, IFA Aquaculture; Dr. Mark Norman, Taighde Mara Teo; Cindy O'Brien, Abalone Chonamara Teo; Damian Toner, Aquaculture Initiative; Dr. Terence O'Carroll, Bord Iascaigh Mhara; and Dr. Paul Sikora, Dunstar ltd.
The project is mainly funded by the Department of Education and Science's STRAND III Programme. It is also supported by BIM.
The project is supervised by Dr. John Lohan(SERG) and both Brendan Allen and Dr Ian O' Connor (RACE). Laurentiu Dimache has been recruited as project manager and Michael Greene as PhD researcher.