A GRAND JOURNEY

I wrote this update to a few of our team members the other day. It has received such positive feed back I thought I would share it on my blog.

Written on October 9, 2013

"I keep trying to remember most people (including investors and some on our own team) do not have any real grasp of the size and scope of what we at GBT are now within weeks of bringing to the world.

We have had the biology and the water quality systems figured out since 2005. 

Heck, we knew in 1999 we could grow shrimp (and other fin fish species) bigger, faster, more efficiently, sustainably, and in a  natural fashion, better than anyone or any system in the world could even imagine.

The real challenge (for me at least) had always been conceiving, designing, and then actually building the integrated multitude of mechanical aspects essential to developing an industrial scale, commercial sustainable aquaculture operation, of the size and scope we envisioned. 

I was never (and still am not) interested in just developing a boutique system that could be sustainable and make a few million dollars in profit. 

I wanted to build something green, environmentally friendly, natural, bio-secure, and that produced "healthy protein" on a grand scale. 

I wanted to develop a "game changer" to use an archaic phrase.

I won't bore everyone again with the multitude of "technological break through's " we have made since 1999 and especially since 2011. (I also won't remind you I thought I could do it in 7 years or less).

But I think the following words from one of the engineers at Arizon who are currently producing one of the largest dome structures in the world for GBT's first production module, coupled with two pictures might just help everyone get a small grasp of the scale of what we are about to put into production. 

One of the engineers from Arizon wrote an e-mail message to Jim Salmon today. The following is an excerpt from that E-mail. 

"We have been making good progress over the past 4 days.  The AHU’s are on schedule for shipping October 21, and likely one will ship the Friday before.  

The fabric is also still on schedule.  Sections 2 & 3 are 100% welded up, Section 1 is 80% and Section 8 is 70%.  I know, we are making them out of order.  It is all part of the grand plan".

I love the words " the grand plan" because that is what this journey has been, a convoluted torturous march toward a grand plan. 

Each dome (module) has eight ponds in each GBT structure with each pond holding about 1 million gallons of water in each pond. (Yes, that is 8 million gallons of water under a single module and each module is over 1,000 feet long and 155 feet wide and 35 feet or so tall).

The domes are held up by forced air creating a positive pressure that makes them both incredibly strong and adds to bio-security. There are two air handling (AHU's) units per dome and the technology that goes into them is amazing.

No, nothing about this has been easy but when you seek to make a paradigm shift in any technology or production process I guess it is not supposed to be easy. 

I also guess that is why so many of those who continue to claim they can do what we are doing or that they indeed thought of all of this themselves, have failed so miserably. 

They never could understand, let alone imagine the vision I had back at Gulfport, Mississippi in 1999. 

Enjoy the attached pics of the  AHU's.

In a few weeks we will be taking pictures of the actual facility in operational mode. It will have been a long torturous and yes painful journey, but definitely a "grand one".

(please excuse any typos or misspellings, I am just a tad tired tonight). "