Supply Chain Regeneration & Resilience

Could Seaweed Be the Key to Critical Mineral Independence?

New biomining platform eschews environmentally destructive conventional mining to source critical minerals via photosynthetic marine systems.

Published 1 month ago | About a 6 minute read

Image: Rachelle Hacmac/Blue Evolution

In the world of climate solutions, seaweed has emerged as a great green (or brown or red) hope. Along with being a superfood, its incredibly fast growth rate and supercharged carbon-sequestration ability have made it a go-to feedstock for next-generation animal feed, plastic films and packaging, textiles and fuel.

Now, adding to that list, Blue Evolution — a California-based climate-tech company dedicated to leveraging seaweed’s potential to create sustainable solutions for a carbon-negative future — has launched Orca Minerals: the first US-based platform to deliver regenerative biomining of critical minerals using cultivated seaweed, in response to growing global urgency around strategic mineral supply.

Building on over a decade of seaweed farming and bioprocessing led by Blue Evolution, Orca Minerals aims to help set a new global standard for critical mineral recovery — one that restores, rather than extracts. By cultivating seaweed to absorb trace elements such as rare earth elements and strategic metals, Orca introduces Blue Evolution’s Zero+ framework into the mineral economy: zero waste, zero depletion, zero human exploitation — and measurable co-benefits for ecosystems and communities alike.

“Orca’s platform spans both offshore and controlled onshore cultivation — tailored to species, site and mineral profile,” said Matt McGarvey, initiative lead for Orca Minerals. “Its modular systems enable localized production in alignment with biodiversity goals and ocean stewardship protocols.”

A regenerative alternative to extractive mining

While traditional mining remains dependent on global supply chains for refining, Orca’s approach enables onshore, nature-based mineral harvesting and processing. By using seaweed to absorb trace elements from seawater and applying green chemistry to refine them domestically, Orca supports national goals to strengthen resource security while reducing environmental impact.

Backed by a major grant from the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy and a strategic collaboration with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), the Orca team is working with leading US research institutions including UC Davis and Virginia Tech to develop processes that:

Use seaweed to optimally absorb minerals from seawater
Refine extraction techniques to efficiently recover those minerals
Ensure economic viability and resilience in local and global supply chains
Can be implemented both offshore and in controlled onshore environments

Alongside these scientific collaborators, Orca is also pioneering next-generation measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) systems and carbon-accounting protocols — including new frameworks for nature-based blue carbon capture, utilization and storage — to transparently track and monetize ecological co-benefits.

“This research is about understanding how marine plants like seaweed can be harnessed to bioconcentrate rare earth elements from seawater and thus solve a complex mineral-sourcing challenge,” said Dr. Michael Huesemann, Algae Research Team Lead at PNNL. “In our partnership with Blue Evolution, we’ll explore scalable, non-extractive and sustainable solutions that may one day complement or even reduce the need for traditional mining.”

“Our work with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory uncovered something we hadn’t seen before — rare earth elements and platinum group metals in our seaweed,” explained Blue Evolution founder and CEO Beau Perry. “That discovery, backed by the Department of Energy, opened the door to something bigger. It’s what led us to launch Orca Minerals.”

Seaweed for sovereignty

Seaweeds absorb essential minerals from seawater — including rare earth elements such as scandium and yttrium, vital for modern technologies. Where traditional mining is resource-intensive and environmentally destructive, biomining minimizes ecological impact and supports biodiversity.

The launch of Orca Minerals comes at a time when the US is grappling with how to secure and refine critical minerals without relying on overseas processing. Another advantage to biomining them through seaweed is that it creates a sustainable domestic supply chain for these key minerals — something many industries are scrambling to establish in an era of crippling US tariffs on imported goods. As Orca explains in a blog post: “Most Americans don’t realize this, but China grows more than half of the world’s seaweed. And just like with solar panels, lithium batteries and magnets, it dominates not only production — but processing, R&D and price-setting.

“We can beat them. Not by replicating their model, but by doing it smarter. With US innovation — genetics, automation, AI, regenerative design — we can grow more seaweed in Alaska alone than all of China’s current output. That’s not wishful. It’s geography, biology and policy alignment waiting to happen.”

Nearshoring cleantech supply chains

The Orca team is working to extract a range of rare earth elements and strategic metals from seaweed that are essential to clean-energy technologies yet currently rely on environmentally harmful or geopolitically constrained supply chains, including:

Neodymium and Dysprosium – used in high-performance magnets for EV motors, wind turbines, and advanced electronics.
Scandium – a rare earth element with applications in solid-state batteries and lightweight aluminum alloys for aerospace and defense.
Cobalt – a key component in lithium-ion batteries for personal electronics, electric vehicles and energy-storage systems.
Platinum group metals (PGMs) – used in hydrogen fuel cells and catalytic converters.

Orca’s approach offers a regenerative, nature-based alternative.

Fast-tracking equitable, inclusive mineral independence

In addition, as Perry told Sustainable Brands® via email, biomining critical minerals offers yet another advantage over the economic models of conventional mining.

“Where seabed or hard rock mining projects often take 7-15 years just to begin production, we believe the seaweed-based approach can reach meaningful scale in 3-5 years,” he explained. “That timeline reflects the initial maturation of the Orca platform, including new supply chains and extraction technology — but it’s a one-time start-up horizon. Beyond that, each new site scales much faster — with lower permitting friction and capital intensity. We’re building a system where critical minerals can be produced alongside other high-value seaweed co-products — faster, cleaner and closer to home.”

With over a century of combined expertise in seaweed and mariculture, the Blue Evolution team works in close partnership with indigenous and coastal communities to drive restoration, resilience and shared value at scale. Orca Minerals is committed to ensuring Indigenous and coastal communities are not just included but positioned as co-creators of the new mineral economy. The company is building equity structures to enable ownership, R&D collaboration, revenue sharing and leadership across its global partnerships.

Blue Evolution estimates that a first working prototype will be operational by 2027, with commercial viability targeted for 2028. Early work includes development of an onshore grow facility, where seaweed strains can be optimized for mineral uptake. Initial development is focused on red, green and brown seaweed species already in production at Blue Evolution’s Alaska and Mexico operations.