California State coastal officials voted Wednesday to allow a plan to build the United States' largest kelp farm 6 miles (10 kilometers) off the Southern California coast to move forward as the Trump administration seeks to ramp up aquaculture in the Pacific Ocean.
Ocean Rainforest, which is based in the Faroe Islands in Northern Europe, is planning to grow giant kelp on a roughly 3-square-mile (7.8-square-kilometer) stretch of federal waters to develop products to boost soil and plant health in California’s avocado farms and strawberry fields. Some environmentalists are concerned that the lines used to grow seaweed could tangle whales and that increased boat traffic will disrupt an expanse of ocean that has been wild.
