By Lincoln Millstein
BLACK ISLAND, July 2, 2022 - The Department of Marine Resources this week renewed a 20-year lease for Maine’s only finfish farming operator, and, in doing so, drew attention to its own weak enforcement regulations.
The most frequent phrase in the 14-page decision to renew Cooke Aquaculture by DMR Commissioner Patrick C. Keliher was: “no legal requirements.” The document was, in essence, a defense of its non-action after the massive die-off of salmon at Cooke’s farm here last August.
On Page 7, the decision stated, “Ms. Robinson testified that there are no legal requirements to report a mortality event,” referring to the 116,000 dead salmon referenced by Cooke executive Jennifer Robinson.
Later, Robinson “clarified that there is no requirement to report mortalities unless they are confirmed as being disease related.”
On Page 8, DMR Aquaculture Director Marcy Nelson “noted that these types of events are rare and reiterated that Cooke Aquaculture, in accordance with current rules, did not have to report to DMR the August 2021 event as it was not disease related.”
Later, Keliher added, “Cooke Aquaculture is not required to take or track measurements inside the pens.”
‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks - Hamlet’
All this simply called attention to why the DMR was so slow in responding to the die-off.
“Mrs. Nelson testified that DMR tried to visit the sites earlier, but a significant storm precluded staff from visiting the area before November 3, 2021. Mrs. Nelson also clarified if the site visit occurred in August 2021 (during or shortly after the die-off), it would not have provided an indication of how that event may have impacted the bottom conditions, because the die-off would not have had an immediately noticeable impact on the area.”
So why did they try to visit the site earlier if it held no benefit?
And what about September, October? No benefit to a visit then either?
The QSJ visited the site in September and was struck by how massive the pens were and how out of context such an industrialized operation was in relation to the surrounding islands and the enclosed bay.
Nelson added, “Waiting a few months until after the event provides a better opportunity to visually assess how the area responded to the event. The videos were taken in locations up to 30 meters north and south of the cages to reflect the MEDEP permit sampling locations and directly underneath a sample of pens to visually assess the condition of the bottom and marine organisms under the pens.”
Nelson was identified as a marine scientist. Most scientists I have meet hungered for more data and information, not less. The QSJ asked DMR spokesman Jeff Nichols for explanation of Nelson’s statements but got no reply.
The QSJ obtained emails which showed the DMR wasn’t notified by Cooke for one week, giving it plenty of time to clean the pens. The emails showed Keliher didn’t hear about it for 15 days. nCooke blamed the die-off on low oxygen levels in the pens.
One of the opponents of the renewal, Protect Maine’s Fishing Heritage Foundation, stated:
“Protect Maine is not surprised the Black Island release was renewed. The state is pushing industrial scale aquaculture at any costs. That’s why you see communities in Maine starting to invoke moratoriums to develop responsible aquaculture on the Maine coast.
“Over 100,000 fish died last summer at Black Island, and the lease got renewed anyway for 20 years. That’s how it works in Maine. We sell our oceans to foreign corporations, keep the rules weak and endanger the environment and our traditional fisheries in the process.
The commissioner of the Department of Marine Resources (DMR) was in the dark about the die-off according to emails. Do we think if 100,000 cows died in Albion that the agriculture commissioner wouldn’t be notified immediately? Is that what we want in Maine? Industrial scale aquaculture and foreign corporations owning our Maine waters with irresponsible regulations.
“The renewal of Black Island is another prime example of the state’s failure to properly regulate industrial scale aquaculture and communities are seeing it.”
Stronger regulations needed
Why does the state even need the DMR? Often, the DMR and the DEP work at conflicting interests. Why not tuck the DMR under the DEP to streamline regulations.
Maine did not have industrial fisheries until Angus King became governor. It did fine with mom and pop operations which fed families for generations. The 7,000 lobster licensees are a prime example of a decentralized fishery that did not need a corporate overlord. Same with small shellfish and kelp farms. Moreover, they are sustainable and do not pollute the water.
In 2006, aquaculture lobbyists were successful in pushing the state to increase minimum acreage from 250 to 1,000 for each permit. Canada-based Cooke was among the first to seize upon that. Today, Cooke has marine farms in three distinct areas of Maine: Eastport, Machiasport and Points South, including Black Island just south of MDI. Cooke also operates three freshwater hatcheries at Gardner Lake, Bingham and Oquossoc.
Stronger state regulations are not likely to come from the legislature’s Marine Resources Committee, which seems to have a standing slot for the Maine Aquaculture Association lobbyist at all its hearings.
The QSJ reported that one committee member, Genevieve McDonald, took campaign donations from the industry. The Stonington rep is leaving the legislature to go to work as a lobbyist.
One of the donations came from Fiona DeKoning, whose family raises and harvests mussels, and who is seeking to expand its 150-acre footprint to add a 68-acre mussels farm and a 52-acre scallop farm in Frenchman Bay.
Their application as Acadia Aquafarms is opposed by the MDI Bio Lab, which thinks the site is too close and that the noise from generators will disturb the work at the lab.
“What is the cumulative effect on Eastern Frenchman Bay?” asked MDI Lab’s Jeri Bower. The state has no mechanism to limit the number of farms, only to limit the number per applicant. “I suspect we're seeing a trend for bigger leases, larger footprint.”
“If you look at Acadia Aquafarms, as an example, they have two pending applications and they're two very different scenarios,” Bowers said.
The De Konings hope to use “collector” technology to harvest scallops near MDI Bio Labs, and it’s unclear how many collectors will be in the water and how intrusive they will be to marine navigation and to bay aesthetics.
By far the most controversial application is the one by American Aquafarms for two 60-acre salmon sites in Frenchman Bay. AA is suing the state after its permit was rejected on a technical issue.
Maine charges only $100 an acre for a lease. The $12,000 annual lease for the proposed AA is equal the rent of small office building.
The Norwegian company behind AA would never be allowed to build such a large enterprise in its own country, the QSJ has reported.
The amount of salmon American Aquafarms wants to produce exceeds the total amount licensed to 30 companies in the August 2020 auction for all of Norway.
“For AA to do in Norway what it proposes for Frenchman Bay, it would cost almost $1 billion in permitting fees,” said Henry Sharpe, president of Frenchman Bay United. Even at AA’s lowest projection, the fee would be $500 million, “still a massive amount,” said Sharpe.
With 50 years of experience in salmon farming, Norway has developed rules to protect its waters and waterfront against bio hazards such as disease and pollution. The country has spread out farming sites so no single large enterprise can cause massive, irreparable damage. AA wants to produce 66 million pounds a year out of two facilities in Frenchman Bay.
Keliher stated he renewed the Cooke permit “in the best interest of Maine,” although he did not specify what that meant.
Did he take into account that in 2019, Maine’s sister agency DEP fined Cooke $156,213 as part of a consent agreement for multiple violations at fish farming sites Cooke operates in Hancock and Washington counties, including having too many fish in pens, failing to conduct environmental sampling, and failing to follow a number of procedural measures laid out in the company’s operating permit, including on-time filing of pollution sampling reports and fish spill prevention plans.
That’s an example of the conflicting roles of the DMR and the DEP.
In 2017, after a catastrophic failure at one of Cooke’s facilities, the company paid $2.7 million to settle a lawsuit for violating the Clean Water Act.
Washington state then passed a law phasing out all Atlantic salmon net-pen aquaculture by 2022. The permits issued by the Department of Fish and Wildlife allow Cooke to continue operating its net pens, which are placed directly into Puget Sound waters, by growing steelhead instead of Atlantic salmon.