Marine Institute at Oranmore.
On the 9th June, 2006 An Taoiseach, Mr Bertie Ahern TD, officially opened the new �50 million headquarters of the Marine Institute at Rinville in Oranmore, Co. Galway. The 11,000 square metre building was designed by an award-winning Office of Public Works (OPW) team of architects. It features 54 scientific laboratories for fish stock assessment, environmental and food safety monitoring, fish health programmes, biodiscovery and chemical analysis, as well as a unique crescent-shaped office facility encompassing a 150-seat auditorium.
While the Irish marine sector is currently worth �3 billion per annum and supports 44,000 jobs, the Institute estimates that economic return could increase to �4.5 billion within a decade, according to its new strategy plan "Sea Change - A National Marine Knowledge Research and Innovation Strategy for Ireland 2007 � 2013". This strategy aims to apply science, research and innovation to growing opportunities in the international market for seafood including functional foods, to the commercial application of marine technology in renewable ocean energy systems, environmental monitoring, and to the biodiscovery of new medicines and compounds in marine animals and plants.
Research facilities at Newport
Almost within sight of the new building, in Galway Bay, is Ireland's first test site for prototype wave energy generators, licensed by the Marine Institute to assist innovators with testing of new devices. Further north along the coast, near Newport, Co. Mayo, the Institute's expanded aquaculture and catchment management laboratory at Furnace has recently completed the EU-funded CLIME project (
www.water.hut.fi/clime
) aimed at devising management strategies for lakes in the face of global warming. The laboratory has also been examining reasons for increasing mortalities of wild salmon at sea, sea lice levels on farmed salmon, eel migration and the potential for cod culture in Ireland.
The Explorer DVD
Out at sea, the Institute's two research vessels RV
Celtic Explorer
and RV
Celtic Voyager
have been engaged in missions ranging from the Arctic Circle to the Lesser Antiles, including the detailed surveying of the seabed off Ireland, habitat mapping, international fisheries surveys, oceanographic studies, the maintenance of the Irish databouy network and the deployment of prototype wave energy devices. A thirty-six minute DVD of a typical mission on the RV
Celtic Explorer
� "Explorer: A Deeper Understanding" � is available from the Institute on
www.marine.ie
.
Contact: Dr John Joyce,
Marine Institute, Rinville, Oranmore, Galway.
Tel. 091 387 200. Fax. 091 387 201
Web:
www.marine.ie
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