Waterdance Work With The WFPO And Seafish On Low-Emission Gear Trial

The Western Fish Producers’ Organisation is a cooperative that represents vessels across England including 16 vessels from the Waterdance fleet. One of the key aims of the WFPO is supporting innovative sustainability projects, including most recently the Sumwing trial.

The Sumwing is a major innovation in beam trawl gear that has been designed to fly just off the seabed, reducing drag and therefore fuel use; this is particularly relevant for Waterdance as 12 of our vessels are beam-trawlers.

The Sumwing was designed and developed in Holland, it has an 84% reduction in seabed contact from the beam and showed a 9% reduction in fuel use when first tested, the UK trial is hoping to achieve an even greater reduction. The WFPO are now testing the Sumwing on south-western beam trawlers, working with Seafish gear technology experts who designed the trial and are performing the data analysis. The primary aim of this Sumwing trial, was to ensure the technology can feasibly be used on UK beam trawl vessels and to analyse any reductions in fuel consumption.