Group partners with Mote Aquaculture Park to put wastewater to work

US - Future Florida wetlands will benefit from the wastewater of fish if a pilot project underway at Mote Marine Laboratory is successful.

Another benefit of the project will be clean water for use in fish production.

Aquatic Plants of Florida has formed a partnership with Mote Marine Laboratory to use the lab's wastewater to grow native aquatic plants like arrowhead, bulrushes and water lilies. The plants thrive on the nutrients found in the water pumped out of the fish tanks at Mote Aquaculture Park. The plants absorb the nutrients, purifying the water.

"By next spring this will be solid arrowhead," said Gil Sharell, owner of Aquatic Plants of Florida, looking out over one of the ponds his workers had planted. "When it's solid like that the plants take up all the phosphates and nitrates and what comes out on the other side is pure water."

The partnership is funded through the Sarasota County Economic Development Corp.'s cluster initiatives, which contributed $20,000 to the project. The project is a pilot program, however, for Aquatic Plants of Florida, which does $5 million in business each year.

Source: Bradenton