Canada’s Ocean Supercluster has announced a raft of new artificial intelligence-related research and development deals with the private sector, including a $10.5 million, six-company group working on environmental assessments for tidal energy projects.

The Supercluster has made funding AI a priority in recent months, with the federally backed oceantech hub having last spring announced a dedicated AI research program with two streams, one for companies interested in studying potential future applications for AI and one for businesses actively looking to deploy the technology.

Here’s a look at the funding packages:

AI for Fisheries Regulators

A team led by Victoria, B.C.’s Archipelago Marine Research is receiving $148,500 from the Supercluster towards a total project value of $581,500.

The project will aim to create artificial intelligence systems capable of using electronic monitoring methods to track fish movements from boats, compared to the labour-intensive approach of manually reviewing video footage and sensor data -- the approach usually employed in fisheries monitoring efforts, such as by industry regulators.

Other partners on the deal include Archipelago’s fellow Victoria company, Barnacle Systems, as well as the Canadian Groundfish Research and Conservation Society, the Canadian Sablefish Association, the Pacific Halibut Management Association, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the University of Victoria.

“The required effort and cost for EM (electronic monitoring) data review has been a challenge since the inception of EM,” said Archipelago CEO Gord Snell. “The longer the fishing trip and the more cameras carried by the vessel, the more hours of footage that require human review. This can mean higher costs for our clients.

“Large scale introduction of AI tools into the data review process is a big step forward to reduce those costs and increase the use of EM in Canada and around the world.”

AI For Oyster Production

Halifax aquaculture startup Clean Valley CIC and biomonitoring specialists IntegraSEE will jointly lead a more-than-$1 million research consortium, including $415,000 from the Supercluster, in developing technology to use mussel behaviour to detect waterborne illnesses.

Biomonitoring refers to the process of using biological markers in natural organisms to detect pathogens or pollutants. IntegraSEE was already working with mussels, but the Supercluster project will involve the company integrating its systems with Clean Valley’s technology for growing algae in wastewater from land-based aquaculture pens — with the algae then serving as oyster feed.

The system, which will be installed at Clean Valley’s oyster hatchery on Sober Island, near Sheet Harbour, NS, will eventually be capable of helping aquaculture operators make decisions around issues like water temperature, ammonia levels and pH balance.

“From an (oyster) farmer's point of view, it can be an early warning system, preventing mortalities from Red Tide,” said Clean Valley CEO Nicholas LaValle. “It can also allow them to open up their farms sooner after major rainfalls.

“And then from a hatchery perspective …  it can let us know feed rates, how often to feed the oysters.”

Joining as project partners will be aquaculture operator Sober Island Oysters, with whom Clean Valley is already collaborating, as well as Westville, N.S.-based Aqua Production Systems, Portuguese fish farming giant SEAentia and environmental jobs training and certification specialist Eco Canada.

Clean Valley also recently launched its pre-seed funding round with a target of $1.5 million on the back of successful trials of its technology with SEAentia. And on Thursday, the startup was one of five accepted into the latest cohort of Energia Ventures, the Fredericton-based accelerator affiliated with the University of New Brunswick.

“The big piece of IntegraSEE’s IP (intellectual property) and development over the years has been using animals to talk about habitat health,” said the company's vice president of strategy, Mike Hayes. “An oyster farm is the perfect application."

He added that with the industry' switch to predictive analytics, "we have the knowledge and IP to be able to use it as part of the management of an optimal growing environment.”

AI for Seaweed Growth Monitoring

Kitchener, Ontario-based Coastal Carbon, which provides monitoring services and carbon credit verification for seaweed aquaculture companies, along with seaweed farm operator HoldFast of St. John’s, will collaborate to develop small, modular sensors for monitoring seaweed growth.

The two project partners said in a statement the technology will likely be most useful to seaweed farm operators in rural regions, where access to sophisticated tools can be limited.

Of the $1.6 million total project value, $485,000 is coming from the Supercluster.

“Coastal Carbon is dedicated to the remote monitoring and measurement of ocean biomass, facilitating regenerative seaweed farming, ocean restoration, and the scaling of blue carbon initiatives,” said the Supercluster in a statement. “In parallel, HoldFast NL is committed to revitalizing Canada’s east coast through regenerative seaweed farming.”

AI for Environmental DNA Monitoring

Project partners eDNAtec, the St. John’s-based environmental monitoring startup, and Toronto digital mapping and geospatial analytics company Esri Canada will develop an AI platform for environmental monitoring.

The system will be trained on the large database of environmental DNA — genetic material deposited in an environment by organisms — that eDNAtec has gathered over the course of its operations.

Normally, the company uses water samples collected from boats or shorelines to identify which organisms are present in a given marine environment. The business’s key customers include government agencies and energy companies conducting environmental impact assessments.

The Supercluster will provide $75,000 of the total $352,000 project cost.

AI for Scaleable Fisheries

A team led by Vancouver’s OnDeck Fisheries AI will develop infrastructure to help existing fisheries monitoring operations incorporate artificial intelligence into their workflows, allowing them to scale their operations without ballooning staffing costs.

Specifically, the platform will aim to address bottlenecks in how data is gathered and analyzed from electronic monitoring systems on fishing vessels — not unlike the Archipelago Marine Research project.

Other partners on the project include Prince Rupert, B.C.-based Teem Fish Monitoring; the First Nations-run Ha’oom Fisheries Society, also based on the West Coast; satellite communications and image processing specialists Snap Information Technologies, the Canadian Groundfish Research and Conservation Society, eco group Ocean Wise, Goodfish Seafood Co. and technical services company J.O. Thomas & Associates.

The Supercluster said in a statement it is contributing $1.5 million to the project, but did not specify the total expected cost.

AI for Safeguarding Habitats

Led by Bedford, N.S.-based Innovasea, the $10.5 million HydroAware project will use fish-tracking AI to help renewable energy operators study how proposed renewable energy infrastructure could impact marine life, helping operators navigate the regulatory approval process.

For example, hydroelectric facilities in Canada are required to provide ways for fish to get past dams, which can be facilitated by better data.

Of the total eight-figure cost to develop HydroAware, the Supercluster is paying $5 million. Other partners on the project include the Fundy Ocean Research Centre for Energy, tidal energy company BigMoon Power, Nova Scotia Power, New Brunswick Power Corporation, and Dalhousie University AI hub DeepSense.

Previous attempts to develop tidal power at the Bay of Fundy, a region where Fundy Ocean Research and BigMoon both have business interests, have been plagued by concerns from regulators, including question marks related to the effects proposed turbines could have on sea life.

“The HydroAware project is going to build upon the significant advancements Innovasea has made with tagless fish detection technology over the last few years while working with many of the same partners,” said Innovasea president Mark Jollymore.

“That technology is giving hydropower producers better, real-time data on fish activity in and around their infrastructure today to help meet the dual mandate of protecting wildlife and improving operations.”