The spirulina grown by Earthrise Nutritionals is technically a plant. It is also, it turns out, a very patient chemist. Over hundreds of millions of years, this microscopic blue-green algae learned to manufacture its own pigment just to filter the wavelengths of sunlight it didn’t want. 

That pigment is now the basis of one of California’s more unusual food-industry crop ingredients: a natural blue colorant called LINABLUE – one that grows where most crops won’t.

Headquartered in Calipatria, at the edge of the Sonoran Desert in California’s Imperial Valley, Earthrise Nutritionals has been cultivating spirulina for over 40 years, making it the first spirulina farm in North America and one of the largest operations of its kind in the world.

Earthrise Nutritionals: Growing a Superfood in the Desert

Spirulina is an algae that wants heat, sunlight, dry air, and clean mineral-rich water. The Calipatria plant offers all four in abundance. “This is the perfect land because of the sunlight availability, the little precipitation that we have,” says Tomo Maguchi, Plant Manager and Director of Engineering at Earthrise . Rain disrupts the pond chemistry. In Calipatria, rain is a rarity.

The 108-acre site draws Colorado River water through a network of canals shared with the surrounding Imperial Valley agricultural region. Inside 37 open-air production ponds, the water is dosed with nutrients and seeded with spirulina, which rises to the surface to absorb California sunlight and photosynthesize. 

The dry desert air naturally helps regulate the pond temperature, keeping the spirulina within its optimal growing range. “It’s like a naturally occurring temperature regulation,” Tomo says. “That’s one of the things that makes this place special.”

Inside the 72-Hour Pond Cycle

Spirulina is a fast-growing crop, and Earthrise moves quickly to keep up. “Every 72 hours we have a new cycle of spirulina growing in the ponds,” says Esther Pasos, a chemical engineer who manages Earthrise’s spirulina pond culture and has spent more than a decade on the operation’s science side.

The growing season runs from March through November. “Our peak season is in the summer,” Esther says. “We can process three times more than in the winter season.” During those peak months, the harvest plant runs 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. Esther’s job is to keep that plant up, measuring 9 or more pond parameters daily to ensure the spirulina stays healthy.

When a pond is ready, the team doesn’t drain it. They harvest a portion of the biomass, dewater it through the harvesting system, run it through a cake-wash process with potable water, and spray-dry it in a matter of seconds to preserve nutrients. 

The finished powder goes into oxygen-barrier bags and vacuum-packed 20-kilogram boxes. Shelf-stable, nutrient-locked, ready to ship.

From Spirulina to LINABLUE to LinaX

Earthrise’s product catalog runs in three directions.

Spirulina Powder

For consumers, Earthrise sells spirulina in tablet and loose powder forms. More than 50 percent of that powder, by dry weight, is protein. It also carries antioxidants that support cardiovascular health and the immune system. “Spirulina is packed with benefits for health,” Tomo says.

LINABLUE

For food and beverage companies, Earthrise sells raw spirulina powder as an ingredient and, more distinctively, LINABLUE, the brand name for the natural blue colorant extracted from the algae. The scientific name of the molecule is phycocyanin. 

The market is reaching for it because consumers have grown skeptical of synthetic food dyes. LINABLUE can be used as a standalone blue, mixed with yellow to produce a natural green, or blended with other food-safe colorants to expand a manufacturer’s palette without a single synthetic additive.

LinaX

For agriculture and specialty manufacturers, Earthrise sells LinaX, the nutrient-dense residue left after extracting the blue pigment. LinaX still retains much of spirulina’s nutritional profile, making it useful as a soil amendment and bio-stimulant for other growers. 

Some ink manufacturers also use it as a base ingredient in natural inks. The result is one crop that results in three products and very little waste.

Where the Tech Meets the Farm

Earthrise has spent the last several years retooling a 50-year-old aquaculture operation with software, hardware, and closed-loop design.

The water system is the first example. “All the water that we use stays within the pond,” Tomo says. They line the ponds so they can fully recycle the nutrients and water inside the system. There is no discharge to the surrounding desert. For a farm operating in a water-stressed region, that is not a small detail.

The second example is machine learning. Earthrise’s engineers built a convolutional neural network, a deep learning model trained to analyze microscope images of spirulina and automatically grade its health. “It gives us a score of the health of the spirulina,” Tomo says, “which helps us gain that technological momentum.” What used to require a trained technician under a microscope now happens in seconds, enabling the farm to catch and respond to problems faster.

The third example is a brand-new harvest plant, which Earthrise inaugurated in 2025. Built on more than four decades of accumulated operational knowledge, the plant uses an updated process design for more efficient, unit-based spirulina processing. Tomo calls the shift a move toward “smarter culture.”

Taken together, Earthrise is one of the clearer examples in California of what ag-tech looks like – carefully layering onto a long-running farm rather than grafting onto a startup.

Where to Find Earthrise Products

Earthrise sells its California-grown spirulina tablets and powder directly through earthrise.com and through select health food and supplement retailers. LINABLUE and LinaX find use as B2B ingredients to food, beverage, agricultural, and specialty manufacturers worldwide. The California piece is deliberate. “California-grown means producing with responsibility, high quality, and sustainability,” Tomo says.

Learn More About The Imperial Valley

To dive deeper into Imperial Valley, read about the California Midwinter Fair or about what grows in Imperial County. Looking for more California farms to follow? Browse more CA GROWN grower profiles on the blog or plan your next farm visit on Experience California Agriculture.

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Frequently Asked Questions About Earthrise Nutritionals

What does Earthrise Nutritionals make?

Earthrise grows spirulina and produces three product categories: consumer supplements (tablets and powder), B2B ingredients (raw spirulina powder and LINABLUE natural blue colorant), and a nutrient-dense residue product called LinaX used for soil enrichment and natural inks.

What is LINABLUE?

LINABLUE is Earthrise’s brand name for the natural blue colorant extracted from spirulina. The molecule is called phycocyanin. It’s used as a clean-label alternative to synthetic food dyes and can be blended with other natural colorants to produce green and other hues.

Where does Earthrise spirulina grow?

Earthrise’s 108-acre spirulina farm is in Calipatria, California, at the edge of the Sonoran Desert in Imperial Valley. The farm uses Colorado River water and 37 open-air production ponds.

Is spirulina a fruit, a vegetable, or an algae?

Spirulina is a microscopic blue-green algae. It’s a photosynthetic organism humans have been consuming as food for centuries. Nutritionally, it’s a complete protein full of antioxidants, B vitamins, and iron.

This article was written by CA GROWN Content Creator Aida Mollenkamp, and images from Salt & Wind.