Sea Day 107, S. Africa

The Wonders of Kelp
With a long history entwined with humankind and a profound potential as a renewable energy source, kelp and other seaweeds may be the most underappreciated plant life on the planet. Stone Age man harvested mussels and other shellfish off the kelp that grew off the shores of today's South Africa. Scholars further believe that kelp forests have flourished around the coasts of the Pacific Rim for some 12,000 years, attracting a huge diversity of marine life close to shore, from turtles to mollusks. Humans were at the top of this food chain and followed the fish-and the kelp—in a millennia-long migration from Northeast Asia to the Americas.
Much later in the 1800s, Scottish Highlanders harvested, dried and burned kelp to produce soda ash, known today as sodium carbonate, still used as a water softener today. During World War I, countries from the United States to France used it to manufacture gunpowder. In addition, some kelp is processed into alginate, a thickening carbohydrate used in ice cream, jelly and toothpaste.
But the most beneficial use of kelp is just being uncovered. Some Scandinavian countries such as Sweden are harvesting vast amounts of the plant from their long-established kelp farms and working to convert
its methane and sugar into bio-fuel for automobiles. Over time, massive open-ocean farms could be planted to provide a source of clean energy. And with kelp's staggering growth rate— up to two feet per day —the fuel supply could be infinite.Read more