The Beginning

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In 2009, Visi started his own farm, where he worked on cultivar development and explored which species could be used to remediate specific eutrophic water sources. He opened the first land-based, year-round sustainable commercial sea vegetable farm in the United States. He selected Sequim Bay, on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state, in order to take advantage of the sunny climate and the eutrophic bay and its watershed. Its tanks held 9,600 gallons, and he eventually grew twelve seaweed species, three of which were kelp, while bio-remediating Sequim Bay’s water.

In 2009; Mr. Visi was able to win Washington State’s Clallam County Entrepreneur Challenge Contest for the most innovative “green” business plan involving a SSTC-System farm using a large greenhouse.

The (pilot/prototype) SSTC System was finally developed during 2009-2011 research & commercial growing operation involving a 2,400-square foot greenhouse to house the-tank farm located on Sequim Bay, WA. 

Sequim Bay is a known eutrophic watershed influenced by no-point discharge throughout the watershed, which was a difficult site because there were many eutrophic inputs from intensive commercial shellfish beds, dairy farm runoff, wastewater treatment facility, slow water circulation issues, and a strong influence from the freshwater estuary fed by the Olympic National Park. However; Sequim Bay ultimately demonstrated that the SSTC System used in conjunction with various specific species of seaweed was capable of remediating various water chemistry & salinity with those types of eutrophic loading.

 The farm (photos below) cleaned eight million gallons of Sequim Bay water from 2010 to 2011.