Category: Customers

Using Oceanbox to make better decisions

When the ocean is your workplace, understanding current conditions is essential for safe and efficient operations.

For Bjørøya, it is not just about production. It is about understanding the dynamic environment they operate in and actively using that knowledge to ensure good fish health, reduce risk, and protect the surrounding ecosystem.

Through a long-term partnership with Oceanbox, Bjørøya has taken a clear step toward more data-driven management of its sites. The collaboration provides immediate access to high-resolution models of ocean currents, temperature, and salinity, as well as the ability to simulate particle dispersion and biological impact over time.

From local experience to data-driven insight

Bjørøya has always had strong knowledge of the coastal areas where they operate. However, they lacked a tool that could provide a more comprehensive understanding of how ocean currents, particles, and interactions between sites actually move, and how conditions evolve over time.

We wanted better insight into the environmental conditions around our sites – not just point measurements, but a bigger picture that develops over time, says Espen Havstein Lindseth, Head of Environment and Facilities at Bjørøya.

With Oceanbox, the company can visualize how ocean currents move – and how particles, nutrients, or sea lice may spread between sites. What previously required extensive analysis and specialized expertise can now be explored internally, whenever needed.

The models give us a deeper understanding of how ocean currents affect both operations and the environment. This makes us better equipped to plan, optimize, and document our decisions.

An operational tool – not just analysis

For Bjørøya, Oceanbox has become an integrated part of daily operations.
The tools are used for:

• Analyzing and understanding specific events, as well as internal variation within sites
• Planning stocking and fallowing, based on seasonal changes in currents and water stratification
• Assessing site structure, to understand interactions between locations and reduce infection risk
• Documenting environmental conditions, in dialogue with authorities and partners
• Analyzing and understanding specific events, as well as internal variation within sites

What used to be difficult to explain in words, we can now demonstrate through modeling and statistics. The visualizations make complex processes more intuitive. You don’t have to be an oceanographer to understand what‘s happening in the ocean, says Eskil Bendiksen, Head of R&D at Bjørøya.

A strategic choice for the future

The aquaculture industry is facing increasing expectations related to documentation, sustainability, and predictable operations. For Bjørøya, the partnership with Oceanbox is part of a long-term strategy: combining local experience with model-based insight to make better decisions.

Oceanbox is designed to make advanced ocean modeling accessible in day-to-day operations, quickly and easily, without the need for in-house modeling expertise or resources to set up complex simulations.

Eskil Bendiksen & Espen Havstein Lindseth from Bjørøya.

We aim to stay ahead, both in terms of production and our understanding of the environment we operate in. Oceanbox helps us connect expertise and data, allowing us to build on the knowledge we already have, says Eskil Bendiksen.

The road ahead

Bjørøya plans to use modeling actively going forward, both in internal planning and in projects related to environmental monitoring and sustainable site development. By integrating model results more closely with their own measurement data, they will further strengthen their decision-making foundation.

For Oceanbox, the collaboration confirms that high-resolution ocean modeling is not just for the largest players, but a practical management tool for all fish farmers seeking better oversight, reduced risk, and more well-documented decisions.

Bjørøya demonstrates how modeling can become a natural part of daily operations. When increased environmental understanding is applied in operational decision-making, it creates real value, says Svenn Hanssen, CEO of Oceanbox.