Two land-based fish farming proposals—one in Jonesport and one in Belfast—are in legal limbo at the moment, while a third proposed recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) in Bucksport has let its permits expire.
Since publishing this story in our print edition, Nordic Aquafarms has announced it has dropped its bid to site a plant in Belfast.
The only active land-based project currently is Great Northern Salmon in Millinocket, which is aiming to build a salmon farm that will produce more than 7,500 metric tons, or 16.5 million pounds, of freshwater raised salmon per year.
The co-founders of the Millinocket company, Marianne Naess and Eric Heim, were at one time involved in the proposed Belfast project under the corporate banner of Nordic Aquafarms. Naess, the CEO of the Millinocket project, says she holds little hope for the success of any salmon farm on the coast.
“This is my fourth,” Naess said. “I was involved in one of the contentious ones on the coast [Belfast.] The future of salmon farming in the U.S., in our opinion, is in freshwater and away from the coast. I don’t think you’ll see any RAS facilities on the coast in the near future.”
Great Northern Salmon is located on a 45-acre former paper mill site. Working in partnership with Our Katahdin, a local nonprofit, the company has begun cleaning up two lagoons located on the property—one five acres and the other 22 acres. The papermill filtered the sludge and deposited it in the lagoons before discharging the residue into the river.
“Basically, this is a clean-up project funded by the EPA,” Naess said. “‘Our Katahdin got a $5 million grant to do this.”
She said the remediation work is expected to be finished by late summer 2025. The company projects the salmon farm will create 70 full time jobs with benefits. Unlike virtually every other salmon farm proposed in Maine, the Millinocket plant has encountered no opposition during the permitting process.
“We have great support in the community,” Naess said. She said Great Northern’s operation will be small in comparison to projects proposed along the coast. The product, she said, will be trucked to Boston and distributed regionally.
“It can’t be too small,” she added, “but with all of the technology you have to implement and the treatment discharged, you need a certain scale. There is a sweet spot. A lot of these proposals, I think, initially, were too big.”
Kingfish, Maine, Inc., a subsidiary of The Kingfish Co. in the Netherlands, is awaiting a decision by the Law Court of the Maine Supreme Court on a permit related to its proposal to grow yellowtail kingfish on land.
Kingfish is proposing a $110 million RAS facility, which the company says will eventually produce 8,000 metric tons of yellowtail kingfish a year and create between 70 and 100 jobs.
The Maine Business and Consumer Court is considering a challenge to the permit the Jonesport Planning Board granted to Kingfish. The permit is being contested by the conservation group Protect Downeast and four individuals.
Opponents say wastewater from the operation would pollute Chandler Bay with nitrogen, among other things, and could lead to toxic algae blooms. But Kingfish representatives claim there are multiple safeguards to monitor the effluent going into the bay.
Farther down the coast, Nordic Aquafarms, which has faced strong opposition in Belfast to their proposed $500 million salmon farm on the Little River, has a suit pending in Maine Superior Court against the Belfast City Council. The suit was triggered by the council’s vote May 7 to reverse approval of the seizure of
intertidal land Nordic required to lay pipes between the farm and the sea.
The city reversed its approval of the eminent domain action following a court ruling that Nordic Aquafarms did not have the right to lay pipes across the mudflats, which had disputed ownership.
In Bucksport, Whole Oceans in 2018 proposed building a land-based salmon farm on the site of the former Verso paper mill. Local residents embraced the project as a means of replacing the jobs and taxes once provided by Verso. But since that time, Whole Oceans’ local permits have expired.
The Maine Monitor recently reported the development, operation, and management of the project are likely the issue with the end cost much higher than what was originally projected.
