Sewage-eating mussels as animal feed

07 July 1998

Sewage-eating mussels as animal feed

MUSSELS developed on a diet of sewage could be used in the feed of salmon, pigs and chickens under an innovative proposal to process municipal waste in the Norwegian seaside community of Larvik, on the Oslo fjord.

Daga Osca Oppen-Berntsen, a researcher with industrial company Norsk Hydro, has been working on mussel farming as part of the Maricult programme which aims to exploit the seas as a resource for the production of food, raw materials and energy. It is conducted in co-operation with the European Union.

He calculates a mussel farm could treat waste at one-tenth of the cost of the proposed treatment plant in the area.

Part of the programme requires finding things to do with the mussels produced in this way, including the possibility of using them in animal feed.

• Financial Times 07/07/98 page 18