Circular Economy - Aquaponic Systems

Objective

In the winter semester of 2024, the participants had the task to continue the work of a previous group of students in the EPS and to answer the question: How can aquaponic systems be used and implemented in Austria? With a focus on potential carbon savings and profits compared to imported goods.

The main goal of the project was to improve a circular economy simulation of aquaponic systems in form of farms and their networks within the AnyLogic simulation software, which was created by the previous semester. This was done to investigate how the simulation could be optimized to help to demonstrate the economic feasibility and environmental impact in regards of CO2 savings of aquaponic farms in Austria.

Project steps

Since a very detailed simulation had already been created in the previous semester, the current semester's students divided their tasks into several sections. First, they had to thoroughly analyze the previous work along with the simulation. Then, they conducted in-depth research on various topics that had been left inaccurate or incomplete in the previous work. Numerical studies were conducted on private and commercial farms in terms of energy costs, carbon emissions saved, cascading usage, and green energy usage. This research aimed to improve the simulation and make it more accurate.

Results

The results of this intensive work were impressive. The students were able to answer a series of research questions more precisely and substantiate their findings with research results and simulation runs. They also improved the usability and design of the simulation. At the end of the project, it was shown that a number of aquaponic farms could be an economically feasable and environmentally beneficial alternative to imported fish and conventionally grown vegetables.

These results were demonstrated by the students using the customized simulation, statistics, and a newly developed tool that can be used by future producers to make investment decisions. The project thus demonstrated the potential of aquaponics systems as a sustainable solution for future food production and the importance of further refining simulation tools and exploring innovative solutions to improve the efficiency and sustainability of aquaponics systems.