Initial orientation for aquaponics projects
Aquaponics projects are complex. Even an initial assessment requires assumptions about system size, plant production, fish production, investment costs, operating costs, energy demand, revenues and day-to-day operation.
With the APM Aquaponics Calculator, we provide a tool that allows first scenarios to be calculated as an initial estimate. The calculator does not replace a feasibility study or individual planning, but it offers a useful first orientation: What scale is realistic? What production volumes are possible? What investment costs can be expected? And under which conditions can a project become economically interesting?
Why an aquaponics calculator?
Aquaponics combines aquaculture and plant production in a coupled recirculating system. This creates specific opportunities, but also specific requirements for calculation.
In conventional rough calculations, individual branches of operation can often be considered relatively separately. In aquaponics, the different areas are more closely connected: fish feed becomes the basis for fish growth and plant nutrients. Water is used several times. Heat, energy, land use, crop cycles and production volumes all influence economic viability together.
That is why aquaponics cannot be calculated meaningfully by looking at only one part of the system. Even for a rough assessment, key assumptions have to be brought together.
The Aquaponics Calculator helps to make these relationships visible.
What can the calculator estimate?
The calculator allows an initial assessment of aquaponics scenarios. Depending on the input values, it can estimate aspects such as:
- possible production volumes
- investment costs
- operating costs
- revenues
- cash flow
- economic dimensions
- effects of different system configurations
This makes the calculator particularly useful in an early project phase. It helps to structure ideas, understand orders of magnitude and compare different assumptions.
Enter your own values or use presets
The calculator is being developed step by step. In addition to entering individual values, more and more presets will be added over time. These presets represent preconfigured system scenarios that can be selected with one click and then adjusted.
The reason for this is simple: during planning, certain constellations repeatedly prove to be particularly useful. Size, construction method, crop cycles, year-round operation, heat supply and production volumes do not act independently of one another. In some combinations, these parameters reinforce each other and can significantly improve the economic perspective.
Presets are therefore not only intended to make the calculator easier to use. They also show which types of systems and operating models we consider particularly interesting.
Users can test their own assumptions, but also start from prepared scenarios based on typical project constellations.
Economic viability depends on the location
The calculator can provide initial indications of whether an aquaponics project could be fundamentally interesting. Actual economic viability, however, always depends on the specific location.
Wichtige Faktoren sind zum Beispiel:
- available space
- construction method and investment framework
- heat supply
- electricity and water costs
- water availability
- possible use of existing infrastructure
- target crops and sales prices
Aquaponics projects can be particularly interesting where several location advantages come together: existing buildings or areas, favourable heat, regional sales opportunities, direct marketing or an existing agricultural business looking to develop a new branch of activity.
Who is the calculator for?
The Aquaponics Calculator is intended for anyone who wants to better assess a possible aquaponics project. This includes, in particular:
- farms
- horticultural businesses
- operators of biogas plants
- project developers
- municipalities
- (planned) cooperatives
- research institutions
- initiatives in the field of sustainable agriculture
- investors and operators of larger systems
The calculator can help translate an initial idea into numbers. It also shows where further clarification is needed and which assumptions are particularly important for the next project phase.
From first scenario to feasibility study
The calculator is a starting point. It can show whether a project idea should be pursued further. For concrete investment decisions, funding applications, site assessments or financing questions, however, an individual feasibility study is required.
In a feasibility study, the location, technical concept, production strategy, investment costs, operating costs, market environment and economic viability are examined in more detail. The calculator can provide useful preliminary work for this process, but it does not replace it.
To the Aquaponics Calculator
By clicking the button below, you will leave this website and be taken to the separate website of the APM Aquaponics Calculator.
