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Clean Valley

The mission is legally load-bearing.

Clean Valley CIC is dedicated to inventing, developing and promoting innovations that safeguard our oceans, audited on our ability to do so with the consent of the community.

Three sustainable solutions.

Our first case: the aquaculture industry, and the hope that onshore aquaculture becomes the sustainable protein producer.

Algae Biofilter

Low cost, sustainable water remediation using the natural filtration properties of both bivalves and algae.

Containerized Hatchery

Modular hatchery models co-designed to support oyster spat production where it's needed.

Green Supply Chain

A case study of how waste streams can be valorized into co-products through sustainable innovation.

Commitments, on the record.

From the Community Interest Plan: the operating promises behind the legal form.

  • Hire local community members to manufacture the biofilters and hatchery
  • Source materials locally
  • Partner with small “mom-and-pop” aquaculture facilities
  • No microplastics, harsh chemicals, or deleterious material in our oceans
  • Long-term research into reducing the plastic entering our ocean
  • Update the Community Interest Plan annually, with charity, NPO, and academic partners

The cost of clean water.

By 2050 the world's population is projected to reach ten billion, and the most sustainable protein producer pays 40% more to keep its water clean.

10B

People by 2050

UN-projected world population, driving increased global food demand.

40%

Higher maintenance costs

Onshore versus offshore. Water quality treatment is a major expense for onshore facilities.

$12.2B

Wastewater filtration cost

Estimated global aquaculture wastewater filtration cost (Lux Research, “Blue revolution, onshore aquaculture's wastewater remediation”).

Closer to home: Nova Scotia’s onshore oyster industry faces a lack of local oyster spat due to a parasite known as MSX that has devastated spat availability. This project directly addresses that problem.

What untreated nutrients do.

The algae biofilter removes the primary pollutants, nitrogen and phosphorus, before this chain begins.

How the biofilter stops it

  1. Nutrients accumulate

    Untreated wastewater builds up nitrogen and phosphorus.

  2. Algae bloom

    Excess growth, harmful algae blooms (HABs), blocks light from saturating the water column; littoral plants die off and pH rises.

  3. Dead zones form

    When blooms die off, dissolved oxygen collapses into an anoxic ‘dead zone’ harmful to surrounding aquatic organisms.

  4. Cyanobacteria take over

    Toxic cyanobacteria outcompete other microorganisms, causing poor water quality, animal poisonings, off-flavour compounds (geosmin, methylisoborneal).

Signed into the company's form.

“I Nicholas LaValle, hereby declare that I shall not carry on activities with a political purpose as a director of Clean Valley Bio-filtration Technologies in accordance with the requirements of a Community Interest Company.”
“I Nicholas LaValle, hereby declare that I shall exercise the powers and perform the functions of director of Clean Valley Bio-filtration Technologies in accordance with the community purpose set out in its memorandum of association and designation documents, as required by Section 12 of the Community Interest Companies Act.”

Nicholas H. LaValle, Comprehensive Designer and CEO

Want to learn more?

Get in contact! We would love to support your farms & facilities.