10/05/2026
I made this graphic to explain a little better how this scheme is set up and funded annually. I know the volume actually harvested has been very small and the winter losses have been very low. Do we want professors working on things really do nothing to solve the real problems associated with fertilizer, stormwater, and sewage. Those are the things that close shellfish beds & beaches and drive Harmful Algae Blooms. The repeat grant funding loops support themselves because the Non Governmental Organizations that get the money lobby politicians for it every year and promote it to the public. There have been years where winter losses were almost total with broken kelp lines drifting across our bays and never recovered.
So when you see politicians, scientists, and NGOs directors on the TV and in Long Island's political rags cheering for the Sugar Kelp Fairy as a solution to nutrient pollution take it with a healthy dose of skepticism. The insiders who continue to support it are not ignorant folks, they know this can't scale. The public should be incredulous that this failed program continues, we should also be suspicious of all the NGO grant funding loops.
When a glad handing politician stands up to the microphone and brags how he got the funding for this or claim it is effective ask for the per pound removal cost. There are committees of professionals and panels that have abjectly failed to do the accounting it is not that they are taken it they are part of the whole repeat funding loop and propaganda cycle.
