Kelp is showing up in everything these days– cookies. Hot sauces. Even vodka martinis. The last one may be thanks, in part, to Mark Shear, a kelp and oyster farmer who partnered with a distillery in Ketchikan to develop sugar kelp vodka. 

“And just on a, just on a whim, I was talking with them, and I had just happened to have some seaweed in the plant, and Travis said, ‘Well, let’s, let’s try to make a vodka out of it,’” recalled Shear. “And so we dropped a couple 100 pounds of ground sugar kelp off, and they went and did their voodoo that they do, and whatever it is, and came up with this hold fast vodka, which is, which is freaking awesome! It is really good!”

Shear was one of three mariculture experts who participated in a panel discussion at the Southeast Conference, an annual gathering of regional business and community leaders in Sitka in mid-September. 

His company is one of many that has received funding from the Alaska Mariculture Cluster, a grant coalition working to develop a profitable and sustainable mariculture industry in Alaska in under five years. The cluster was funded by a $49 million grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration under the Build Back Better Regional Challenge program. 

With the support of the cluster, Shear’s business, Seagrove Kelp and Oysters, has not only been able to create over 12 new jobs, but also has gotten a foothold in seafood markets all over the world. Shear is optimistic that his company will continue to  expand.

“If things go to plan, we will build another farm outside of Ketchikan, another scaled oyster grow farm outside of Ketchikan in the new year, and, and then hopefully stock that, and it would hopefully start producing in ‘27,” said Shear.

Panelist Angie Bowers is an assistant professor at the University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) Sitka campus. She said that nearly 90% of alumni from the university’s Applied Fisheries Program found work in the industry and aquaculture fisheries. Three-quarters of those jobs were based in Alaska. Bowers feels these statistics reflect how the mariculture industry has grown since the program began.

“Because I feel like in past years, especially when we first started this program, it was a little bit like the egg before the chicken,” said Bowers. “I guess it was kind of like we’re developing, we’re training these students in this industry that did, there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for them to go into and that’s definitely changing quickly, which is really exciting to see.” 

Dan Lesh is the deputy director of the Alaska Mariculture Cluster. He emphasized that collaboration is key as the industry continues to grow. Through a program the cluster has developed called the Alaska Mariculture Insights, people at all levels of the mariculture industry around the world are able to exchange knowledge. 

“It’s just kind of interesting to see yourself being talked about on a global stage,” said Lesh. “It’s quite inspiring how much excitement and interest there is in what we’re doing. Even though we’re small, we’re innovative. We’ve got so many interesting problems and resources here.”

Amongst other initiatives, Lesh said the remaining $34 million will fund their current and new contractors in research, along with new farming and hatchery techniques, and the cultivation of different kinds of wild seaweeds. By the end of the next year-and-a-half, they hope that all their investments will have paid off so that they can continue on their own from there-on-out. 

“We have to produce something of value to the world, or we this way, industry won’t stand on its own,” said Lesh.

With the Southeast shoreline at their fingertips, all three panelists were optimistic about the potential the industry has to support coastal communities.

Editor’s Note 9-22-25: Edited the audio for brevity

UAS assistant professor Angie Bowers and mariculture program coordinator Sara Ebersol joined KCAW’s Brooke Schafer to talk about the UAS Applied Fisheries program and upcoming opportunities, including a three-day hands-on workshop. Listen to their conversation here:

On September 2, the White House announced $49 million dollars in funding for further development of Alaska’s mariculture industry– that’s mostly shellfish and seaweed. The “Alaska Mariculture Cluster,” led by Southeast Conference, was one of 21 winners in the nationwide “Build Back Better Regional Challenge” program.

$2.3 million of that money is going to the University of Alaska Southeast.

“And so aquaculture and mariculture have been a part of our program for over a decade now. But the mariculture side of things has really started to grow, as the industry has started to receive more attention and more interest over the past years,” said Joel Markis, who directs the applied fisheries program in Sitka.

“And so we’ve seen that portion of our program grow in the last five years and these funding opportunities kind of go in-line with that,” he added.

Markis said the money will support their growing mariculture workforce development program by helping them hire a faculty member, a marketing and recruitment specialist and a technician. It will also fund the development of a climate controlled growth chamber for spawning algae and kelp, along with a commercial kitchen.

“Now that we’ve collected or harvested these organisms out of the ocean, what are we going to do with them? The hope is that, with the addition of a commercial kitchen space that’s FDA certified, we can actually prepare some of these things for food,” Markis said. “[And] give students a glimpse at that side of things of what does it take to actually…turn these different products into food? And then, are there ways that we can potentially add value to them through that culinary side of things?”

Markis hopes this investment in their program will help them bring the mariculture industry to a wider audience and help it grow.

“I think there’s a huge amount of potential out there. We’ve got tens-of-thousands of miles of coastline in Southeast Alaska alone, and the capacity to grow a lot of food in our waters…right here locally and throughout Southeast Alaska,” Markis says. “And so if we can aid in doing that in a responsible manner, in a sustainable manner, and help support the industry by teaching people about the different aspects of mariculture, and of growing food in the ocean, I think it’s something that we’re all really excited about.”

“The Alaska Mariculture Cluster” was one of 529 applicants to the federal funding program. They have five years to spend the funding on eight different projects to develop and expand the industry throughout the state.  

From salmon hatcheries to new mariculture industries like kelp and oyster farms, the possibilities for aquaculture in Alaska abound. A new semester-long program at the University of Alaska Southeast will provide hands-on, in-person training to students from around the state and the country who are interested in pursuing aquaculture as a career. UAS Fisheries Technology professor Angie Bowers joined KCAW’s Erin Fulton on the Morning Interview to talk about the program and how prospective students can join.

For more information, visit aquaculturesemester.alaska.edu or email Angie Bowers at abowers4@alaska.edu.

For years, Bret Bradford has lived the seasonal rhythm of a commercial fisherman. He spends summers gillnetting salmon out of Cordova, and in the winter, he looks for odd jobs around town. 

When a friend asked if wanted to spend the winters growing kelp instead, he saw an opportunity for stable, year-round work. 

“I thought, man, how hard could it be to grow kelp?” he said.

Bradford already has a boat and knowledge of the water. And the timing is perfect: kelp farmers plant seeds in the fall and harvest them in the spring, just before fishing season. 

And he’s not the only one jumping on the kelp bandwagon. Interest in kelp farming has been building in Alaska since the state’s first commercial harvest in 2017. Bradford is one of more than 40 aspiring kelp farmers that have submitted applications to the state since.

But there’s still only a handful of farms producing a commercial crop. Mariculture advocates say that it’s not easy building an industry from scratch, or a market for it. Jumping into an industry still in its infancy isn’t without its challenges.

“For me personally, the biggest challenge of anything that I undertake is dealing with the bureaucracy,” Bradford said.

Before they can put lines in the water, kelp farmers have to apply for state and federal permits, which include opportunities for public comment. The whole process can take up to two years, and a lot of money, time and expertise that fishermen like Bradford may not have. 

Which is why he joined a collective of aspiring kelp farmers in Prince William Sound called Blue Wave Futures. Lawyer and fisherman Joe Arvidson handled the permitting process for all seven farms. 

“And I had no idea what to do and neither did they. And so, I just jumped right into it,” Arvidson said.

In many ways, Blue Wave Futures is still just an idea. Only about half the farms are permitted, and none of them have kelp in the water for a commercial harvest. 

But they are trying to lay the groundwork for a stable industry in the region, answering questions like where they’ll get seed, where kelp grows best, and, most importantly, who will buy their harvest.

“We don’t want to grow a bunch of kelp that we can’t sell, that we don’t have markets for, that we don’t have product development for, or even pilot projects that we can use it for to work on,” Arvidson said.

Since the state government established  a mariculture task force in 2016, the group has been working to grow a shellfish and seaweed farming industry that makes 100 million dollars a year. But that goal is still a long ways off: aquaculture sales totaled just $1.4 million in 2019, according to NOAA. 

The interest in kelp farming is there. Lease applications nearly doubled last year, and a recent training by the Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation and other partners attracted hundreds of participants. The foundation’s executive director, Julie Decker, said they’ve had interest from a diverse group of people, including commercial fisherman, subsistence users, Tribes, Native corporations and people interested in making kelp-based products.

But the infrastructure is still being built.

“It’s not simple and so people that are interested should be prepared for challenges,” Decker said. “You know, whenever you’re doing something new, it’s not necessarily all outlined and cookie cutter off the shelf. “

Decker said one big hurdle is finding buyers for kelp. Blue Wave Futures wants to sell much of their harvest to Mat-Su farmers for fertilizer. Alaska researchers along with other partners are also looking at using kelp in biofuel, and Decker said they’re even hoping to attract a plant to the state to manufacture kelp-based plastics.

“It could really open up the demand for farmed seaweed,” she said,  “which would allow for a lot more people to get involved with the industry and know for sure that they had a market.”

Seagrove Kelp off Southeast Alaska’s Prince of Wales Island is one of just four farms that produced a commercial harvest in the state in 2019. The numbers for 2020 are still confidential, until all kelp farms report numbers to the state.

Founder Markos Scheer said some of their product that aren’t for human consumption, like pet food and fertilizer. But they also sell to companies like Juneau’s Barnacle Foods, which makes a line of trendy kelp-based products like hot sauces and pickles.

This is the farm’s second year growing commercially, and they have faced their share of challenges. Last year, herring spawned on some of their kelp, which delayed harvesting and reduced its quality. 

“You know, you come in with an expectation, if we do this, it’s gonna work this way,” Scheer said. “And then most often, we’re not entirely right. And we’ve got to change that, and we say well this worked and this didn’t and there’s a bit of trial and error in the process.”

But overall, business is going well. They’ve put in applications to add new sites to the 100-acre farm. Scheer hopes expanding will help reach new markets.

“This is the kind of industry that could be a really significant leg on the economic stool for coastal Alaskans because you can do it in so many different places and do it viably,” Scheer said. “You know if we get the industry to a size that it needs to be, it’s gonna be a pillar of the economy for the next 100 years.”

Scheer, like other seaweed enthusiasts, sees kelp as an answer to problems both economic and environmental. It soaks up excess carbon dioxide from the oceans and doesn’t require fertilizers or chemicals once it’s in the water. It could provide an alternative for fishermen during low salmon years in Southeast and other regions.

But whether it will in fact fuel a billion dollar mariculture industry in Alaska is still unknown.

Erin McKinstry is a Report for America corps member. This story was produced in collaboration with Alaska’s Energy Desk.

A local seafood processor is getting into the shellfish game. Silver Bay Seafoods applied for two mariculture leases earlier this year. The leases are good for ten years. If approved by the state, they will install 22 rafts in two separate locations northwest of Sitka for raising shellfish.

According to documents from the Alaska Department of Natural Resources, Silver Bay would lease 163 acres of state-owned tidelands in Nakwasina Sound, near Beehive Island, and 182 acres in Krestof Sound, south of Olga Point. There, they would cultivate both Pacific oysters and spat, which is oyster larvae, grow-out rafts of untreated wood supported by steel beams.

DNR now has until December 5th to review the lease application for Krestof Sound and until December 15th for Nakwasina Sound. Their decision also depends on the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, which must grant Silver Bay a permit for growing Pacific oysters and oyster spat. After that, DNR will announce their preliminary decision.  

Correction: An earlier version of this story stated that the period for public comment had closed. The state is actually taking public comment when their review process is complete. However, the period for the city of Sitka to comment closed in November.