Aquaculture and Energy Use

Abstract

aquaculture The farming of aquatic organisms, including fish, mollusks, crustaceans, and aquatic plants. Farming implies some form of intervention in the rearing process to enhance production, such as regular stocking, feeding, and protection from predators. Farming also implies individual or corporate ownership of the stock being cultivated. embodied energy density The accumulated energy use per area of production. Can include both direct and indirect industrial energy inputs as well as fixation of solar energy in ecological systems. emergy The sum of the available energy (exergy) of one kind previously required directly and indirectly through input pathways to make a product or service. energy intensity (EI) The accumulated energy inputs required to provide a given quantity of a product or service of interest. In the current context, energy intensity is expressed as the total joules of energy required to produce a live-weight tonne of fish, shellfish, or seaweed. fossil fuel equivalents An expression of auxiliary energy inputs from the economy, embodied in goods and services (e.g., 1 unit of electricity1⁄4 3–4 units of fossil fuels). industrial energy analysis (IEA) The sum of the energy (fossil fuel equivalents) needed for manufacturing machinery and products used as inputs to the system, and the fuel energy needed for operation. life-support systems The parts of the earth that provide the physiological necessities of life, namely, food and other energies, mineral nutrients, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and water; the functional term for the environment, organisms, processes, and resources interacting to provide these physical necessities. solar energy equivalents A unit making it possible to combine ecological and economic energy requirements, based on the energy from solar fixation. It takes about 10 times of solar fixation per 1 unit of fossil fuel.