The Chinese have waited 40 years for this "aircraft carrier"

At present, there is an "aircraft carrier" anchored off the coast of Dachen Island in Zhejiang Province. It is as big as two Liaonings and is the world's first 100,000-ton smart fishery aquaculture vessel - "Guoxin No. 1". The blue and white giant ship is like a crouching dragon on the waves, quietly embedded in the sea.

There is a secret on the boat. The staff stared at the screen nervously, and all kinds of machines were busy: sucking fish, pre-cooling, sorting, refrigerating and other processes were shuttling like an assembly line. It only took 45 minutes to pack and ship out the caught yellow croaker. On the other side, Ms. Bi, who lives in Shaanxi Province, was tapping the "Little Yellow Car" on the short video platform.

Two days later, a fresh large yellow croaker from the deep sea will be delivered to the door by a courier and served on the dining table of ordinary people.

Deep-sea fish is a high-quality source of protein. The latest version of the dietary guidelines recommends that people should consume fish twice a week or 300-500 grams. Since the founding of New China, countless scientific and technological personnel have passed on the torch and dedicated their lives and wisdom to this cause in order to allow Chinese people to eat fish and eat good fish.

Since September 1 this year, the yellow croakers raised in the cabin of the "Guoxin No. 1" ship have been caught and put on the market one after another, and high-quality yellow croakers comparable to those in the wild have "swimmed" onto the tables of ordinary people.

This "aircraft carrier" of fishery farming integrates a large number of innovative technologies, opens up a new track in the field of fishery production, and drives the Chinese people's yearning for a better life into a new era.

The Chinese have been waiting for this ship for 40 years

The ocean is known as the "blue granary" for humans to obtain high-quality protein. As early as the Shang Dynasty, there were records of Chinese people eating fish.

At the beginning of the founding of New China, the problem of difficulty in eating fish was very prominent for a long time. Thanks to the efforts of scientific researchers, the artificial breeding of the "four major carps" was successful; breakthroughs were also made in the breeding of shrimps, scallops, algae, etc.

With the development of social economy, we are no longer satisfied with "fishing" every year, but we want to eat good fish, eat healthily and environmentally friendly. This can only be achieved through industrialization.

As early as the 1980s, my country's marine fishery experts proactively proposed the design concept of offshore aquaculture vessels, but due to the weak industrial foundation at the time, this dream was shelved.

On May 20 this year, with the long whistle blowing, "Guoxin 1" was officially delivered and put into operation. It set sail from Haixi Bay in Qingdao and headed for the deep sea, opening a new era of farming the sea and fishing.

"From conception to implementation, the Chinese have waited for 40 years for this ship!" Dong Shaoguang, deputy general manager of Qingdao Guoxin Group, said with emotion on the same day.

Standing on the dock, you can feel its grandeur. It has the physique of a large commercial ship: 249.9 meters long, 45 meters wide, and 21.5 meters deep; but it works as a fishing boat: it has 15 breeding cabins, nearly 90,000 cubic meters of breeding water, and produces 3,700 tons of large yellow croaker annually.

The ship has a displacement of 130,000 tons and a carrying capacity of 100,000 tons. The water volume of one aquaculture tank is more than the water storage capacity of two standard swimming pools. The total water volume of the 15 aquaculture tanks is nearly 90,000 cubic meters.

The shock brought by "Guoxin No. 1" goes far beyond this.

On board, the feeding of fry, water exchange, lighting, and catching of adult fish can all be completed automatically. In the aquaculture monitoring room, the staff is carefully observing the operation of various systems on the ship, such as oxygen, feeding, aquaculture seawater, and aquaculture lighting, through the screen, and monitoring the temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, and pH of the water in the aquaculture cabin in real time.

"We have built an intelligent ship-side control center and a shore-based integrated ship-shore smart cloud platform on board," said Tian Naidong, project and business director of Guoxin CSSC (Qingdao) Marine Technology Co., Ltd. Through this platform, 2,108 measuring points on the entire ship conduct centralized control and real-time monitoring of water, oxygen, light, feed and fish in the aquaculture cabin, so that data from the entire production and breeding process can be transmitted to the shore in real time, ensuring integrated ship-shore linkage and remote shore-based monitoring, truly realizing the intelligence of aquaculture vessels.

This boat was hard-won. In 2019, Qingdao Guoxin Group, together with China Shipbuilding Group, China Fishery Research Institute, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology and other units, began to explore the construction of large-scale aquaculture vessels.

The R&D team conducted independent research, organized more than 80 expert seminars, conducted more than 100 inspections and investigations, clarified more than 1,000 issues on ship technology and aquaculture industrialization, and gradually enriched the "aquaculture ship" from a vague concept into a detailed set of drawings and reports, and completed the research and development, construction and sea trials of the aquaculture ship step by step.

MacKanson, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a professor at the Ocean University of China, believes that the operation of the "Guoxin-1" will not only drive the development of directly related industries such as seedlings, breeding, feed, health, processing, and sales, but will also drive the development of support industries such as ship and breeding equipment manufacturing, fishery intelligent equipment, and deep-sea logistics, and will lead a new round of technological revolution in aquaculture.

Multidisciplinary cross-cutting and integration of key technologies

How was this "aircraft carrier" made?

"The research, design and construction of the 'Guoxin No. 1' aquaculture vessel is a systematic project, which is the result of multidisciplinary integration and integration of various key technologies." said Xu Hao, director of the Institute of Fishery Machinery and Instruments of the Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences.

Aquaculture technology and ship technology have been developed for many years, but deep-sea shipboard aquaculture is still an emerging field to be explored. Although there are precedents around the world for converting commercial ships into aquaculture vessels to carry out aquaculture experiments, there is no mature experience to learn from in terms of how to build ships, how to raise fish, how to implement the industry, and technology and operations.

The researchers seemed to be in a black box. Where the doors and windows were and whether they could get out were all unknown when the ship was first built.

The breeding technicians of "Guoxin No. 1" are setting relevant parameters.

The core model of "Guoxin-1" is called "shipboard cabin maintenance" by scientific researchers, which is an international first.

"No one has ever raised fish on a ship throughout the entire cycle before. Is 'raising fish in shipboard cabins' feasible? How to raise them? How to provide the best growth environment for fish?" Xu Hao said that starting from these questions, the R&D team worked together to overcome one problem after another.

The first is the power system. The size of "Guoxin No. 1" is comparable to that of two Liaoning ships. In terms of the power system, it not only needs to meet the main power demand under cruising conditions, but also needs to comprehensively consider the stable supply of power for the entire ship under different breeding modes. To this end, the R&D team has equipped the work ship with a complete power system including the main generator set, electric propulsion system, shaft propeller propulsion system, and automation system. When the ship is transferring, the electric propulsion system will play a role to meet the navigation needs; when the ship is anchored, the main generator set provides power energy for the entire ship's breeding and processing equipment to ensure the continuity of breeding.

Secondly, the main breeding target of "Guoxin No. 1" is large yellow croaker, which has high requirements for a quiet breeding environment. One of the major difficulties in the design and construction of the ship is the control of vibration and noise.

There are otoliths in the ears of yellow croakers. Since ancient times, Chinese fishermen have had the custom of catching yellow croakers by hitting the boats to catch them. Scientifically speaking, yellow croakers are a farmed fish species with a relatively strong stress response, so suppressing noise has become a key point in scientific research.

Xu Hao said that in response to the equipment and environment that would generate vibration noise on the work ship, the R&D team worked together to come up with a final solution, using active shock-absorbing measures for the main sources of vibration noise to effectively control the vibration and noise levels of the entire ship.

After a number of noise reduction technology improvements, the underwater noise in the aquaculture cabin of the work ship under navigation and aquaculture conditions has reached the level of a silent scientific research vessel.

In terms of water exchange, the work ship uses a low-lift, high-flow aquaculture pump to supply water, so that high-quality seawater at a depth of 40 meters is continuously injected into the aquaculture tank, reaching a total water change frequency of up to 16 times a day, ensuring that high-density farmed fish are always in an excellent seawater living environment.

In order to simulate ocean currents and form a rotating flow field suitable for fish swimming, the water flow rate in the aquaculture cabin of the workboat is always maintained at 0.2-0.4 m/s. "Creating the most suitable growth environment for fish can ensure the vitality of farmed fish." Xu Hao explained that seawater overflows from the drainage pipe to the side to complete water exchange and form a rotating flow field.

In terms of research on water environment control technology and equipment for workboat cabins, the R&D team has equipped workboats with key equipment such as high-efficiency and energy-saving cabin aeration equipment and intelligent light control systems.

Looking down at the deck of "Guoxin 1".

Focusing on the design, development and construction of "Guoxin No. 1", the R&D team has completed innovative achievements centered on "the functions and ship types of large-scale aquaculture vessels" and "the technology and equipment for intensive 'ship-borne tank culture' of fish", and has formed more than 30 independent intellectual property rights, breaking through six key technologies such as ship-borne tank culture, water exchange, anti-rolling and anti-swaying, vibration and noise reduction, anti-corrosion and intelligent centralized control. The project has accumulated more than 60 series of technical achievements, applied for more than 40 patents, including 1 international patent and more than 10 authorizations.

Mobile "sea ranch" advances into the deep sea

Fisheries are an important part of the national food security strategy. In recent years, overfishing has led to the decline of marine fishery resources, and traditional near-shore aquaculture methods such as cages face many problems such as excessive aquaculture density and local water environmental pollution. The development of my country's fishery industry urgently needs to expand into the deep sea and ocean and develop a new marine fishery production method based on aquaculture.

"Based on the Chinese people's aquatic product consumption habits and China's grain security and food safety needs, deep-sea aquaculture is a necessary step," said McConson.

Under the onboard farming mode, "Guoxin No. 1" can self-propel and move between selected anchorages according to water temperature and environmental changes based on the characteristics of fish farming. It can go to the north in summer and to the south in winter, cruising between the Yellow Sea, East China Sea and South China Sea. It farms in the most suitable sea areas based on water temperature, ocean currents, climate, etc., providing suitable temperature and a good environment for fish growth, improving the quality and efficiency of farmed fish, and achieving year-round sustainable supply of high-value fish such as yellow croaker.

On the boat, the yellow croaker just caught has beautiful stripes, golden belly and jade fins, and is of excellent quality. Tian Naidong said that yellow croaker does not like light, and when caught in a dark, oxygen-deficient environment, the adult fish will turn golden and look even better. Therefore, before catching the fish, the workers will adjust the light and oxygen conditions in the breeding cabin.

The captured yellow croaker has beautiful stripes, golden belly and jade fins.

According to previous pilot ship cabin farming experiments and the farming experience of the work ship's operation so far, the farming density of "Guoxin No. 1" is 4-6 times that of traditional cages, and the farming cycle can be shortened by 1/3.

With a load capacity of 100,000 tons and two modes of self-propelled movement and anchoring, "Guoxin No. 1" has both stability and flexibility, and can effectively avoid typhoons, red tides, and pollution, greatly reducing the impact of natural disasters on aquaculture. At the same time, through precise industrial control, "Guoxin No. 1" can effectively reduce the impact on the ecological environment, which is a marine fishery practice that implements the concept of "Green water and green mountains are gold and silver mountains".

Compared with the cage aquaculture system, the "Guoxin No. 1" aquaculture vessel is a more advanced and intelligent new aquaculture system, marking a breakthrough from 0 to 1 in China's deep-sea large-scale aquaculture vessel industry.

Can “Guoxin No. 1” be copied?

"In fact, 'Guoxin No. 1' is already preparing for the operation of subsequent workboats." Tian Naidong revealed that in addition to the main breeding species, yellow croaker, "Guoxin No. 1" is also actively exploring the breeding technology and specifications of workboats for other fish breeding species.

This is a mobile "sea ranch" that can complete the entire process from fish fry loading, feeding and breeding to catching, processing and transportation. It demonstrates, guides and promotes marine aquaculture from traditional models to industrialized and intelligent models, and from fixed aquaculture facilities to mobile aquaculture equipment, expanding the blue development space of the deep sea.

"Guoxin No. 1" has innovated the production mode of marine fisheries. The first five waves of marine aquaculture in my country were all aimed at solving the problem of industrialization of marine biological resource seedlings, while the sixth wave of marine aquaculture will shift from traditional near-shore fishery farming to large-scale industrial production in the deep sea. This transformation is an integrated innovation of the entire industry chain, integrating seedling breeding, industrial farming, ship equipment, artificial intelligence, information technology, etc., opening up a new track and representing the latest production mode of marine fisheries.

"'Guoxin No. 1' has effectively implemented the big food concept of 'demanding protein from rivers, lakes and seas', pushed the aquaculture area from the nearshore to the deep sea, and realized the innovative exploration of marine aquaculture from traditional agricultural production to modern industrial production methods." Wang Jianhui, Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Qingdao Guoxin Group, told reporters that in order to further implement the "Chinese solution" for deep-sea aquaculture, Guoxin Group has launched the Guoxin No. 2-1, No. 2-2, and No. 2-3 aquaculture ship projects, and simultaneously launched the 300,000-ton ultra-large hull function demonstration and overall design, reserved key technologies in advance, and explored parent preservation, seedling breeding and full-cycle industrial aquaculture.

"In the next five years, we will continue to invest in the construction of 50 aquaculture vessels, equipped with 13 supply ships, fuel bunkering ships, and comprehensive test ships, to form a deep-sea aquaculture industry chain with a total tonnage exceeding 10 million tons, an annual output of 400,000 tons of various marine fish, and an annual output value exceeding 50 billion yuan, and strive to create a 'blue granary' at sea." Wang Jianhui said.

Written by Science and Technology Daily reporter Wang Jiangao

Intern reporter Song Yingying ◎

Planning丨Zhao Yingshu, Teng Jipu, Lin Lijun

The pictures in this article are provided by the interviewees. Yang Lun, a reporter from Science and Technology Daily, also contributed to this article.

Produced by Science and Technology Daily and Deep Eyes Studio