Katahdin Salmon is now Great Northern Salmon. The new logo keeps the fish swimming in a round fish tank but changes its colors to dark blue (reflecting the clean, cold water), and the salmon color (representing the product).
Image: Great Northern Salmon.
As WeAreAquaculture reported last week, Katahdin Salmon moves on. After obtaining all the critical permits the company had applied for, Maine-based salmon project RAS announced a rebranding that is now here. Katahdin Salmon enters a new phase and becomes Great Northern Salmon.
In addition, coinciding with the name change, the land-based fish farmer has shared two other important milestones. On the one hand, it has been awarded a total of USD 6 million (EUR 5.5 million) grant to remediate and prepare the project site to construct the RAS facility. On the other, Great Northern Salmon has already decided that Nofitech will be the RAS design provider for the farm.
"Katahdin Salmon has been a good name for the initial development phases in Maine. Now that the company is entering into a new phase, it is the right time to transition to a name that reflects the developments of the company and the way forward but that still ties the company to the local community," CEO of Great Northern Salmon Marianne Naess said about the rebranding.
Great Northern Salmon brand represents the company's vision: producing high-quality salmon in areas with access to plenty of clean and cold water in the Northern USA. This idea has also been transferred to the new logo, which maintains the previous brand's element - fish swimming in a round tank - but changes its colors to dark blue, reflecting the clean and cold water, and salmon color representing the product.
Although the company is now focused on developing its first site in Millinocket, Maine, as it explained last week, the new brand will be scalable for future locations and reflect its ambition to expand to other places in North America. However, the new name also represents the ties to the community that has embraced this first site and its history.
Millinocket facility will be located on a 1400-acre property formerly owned by the Great Northern Paper Company, which permanently closed in 2008 after more than a century of history. When it opened in 1900, it was the largest paper mill in the world, and the first to have an on-site hydroelectric generation and distribution facility.
The Great Northern paper mill was the cornerstone of the community and made the town one of the most prosperous communities in Maine. From Katahdin Salmon's inception, the idea was to help bring prosperity back to an area that has the natural conditions but needed a project that would attract jobs. As Mariane Naess told WeAreAquaculture in an exclusive interview, the land-based salmon farm will create about 80 full-time jobs.
Millinocket with the remaining parts of the paper mill in the foreground and Mount Katahdin in the background. Great Northern Salmon's facility is located to the right of the river. The historical paper mill only occupied a small portion of the property.
Photo: John Hafford / DesignLab.
In the release announcing the new company name, Great Northern Salmon also communicated that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had awarded a USD 5 million (EUR 4.6 million) grant to 'Our Katahdin' – its development partner - to remediate and prepare the site for the construction of the RAS facility.
This grant is in addition to the USD 1 million (EUR 922 thousand) in Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) in Maine funds previously awarded for the same purpose. The sum of both gives a total of USD 6 million (EUR 5.5 million) awarded to prepare the site for the salmon farm in Millinocket.
"The grant will play a crucial role in remediating 26 acres of the former mill site’s wastewater lagoon. This EPA-funded project will clear the way for Great Northern Salmon’s aquaculture project which has secured major project permits and is scheduled to begin construction in 2025," stated Sean DeWitt, president of 'Our Katahdin'.
"Being selected for a substantial grant like this by the EPA speaks to the high-quality work that our development partner 'Our Katahdin' has put into developing the former paper mill site and also the great potential for Katahdin Salmon to repurpose the site," said on her part Marianne Naess.
Thanks to these federal and state contributions supporting the cleanup and infrastructure improvements at the former mill site, the overall CAPEX of the project will be reduced, as well as the construction time, which will advance its schedule by about six months. But, as the president of 'Our Katahdin' stressed, the funds will not only accomplish that. "These investments are laying the foundation for significant job creation and a better economic future for the Katahdin region," he claimed.
Nofitech's RAS solutions are a combination of compact design and extensive use of standardized prefabricated units, resulting in lower total costs.
Image: Nofitech.
Finally, Great Norther Salmon - former Katahdin Salmon and one of Xcelerate Aqua's projects - also reported that, after a thorough review of options for RAS design providers, Nofitech was selected for the land-based salmon facility in Millinocket, Maine.
According to the release, Great Norther Salmon's experienced production team has a clear vision for its future RAS design and functionality - as WeAreAquaculture previously reported, it intends to replicate its model in other U.S. locations - and Nofitech's approach was the best fit technically, commercially, and culturally to achieve it.
"It became clear as soon as we started exploring future collaboration that we see things the same way and that Nofitech has a design that is compatible with our bioplan," stated Dean Guest, Great Norther Salmon's Head of RAS Technology. "Nofitech´s reputation for delivering on expectations for cost, performance, and schedule, proven through its repeat business with several customers, was also an important factor in the decision," he added.
For its part, Nofitech thanked Great Northern Salmon for the trust and expressed its pride at having been chosen. "This marks the start of a long-term partnership with Great Northern Salmon, based on shared values, understanding, and objectives," said Robert Hundstad, CEO of Nofitech.
Nofitech's RAS facilities are a combination of compact design and extensive use of standardized prefabricated units, providing a lower total cost than similar ones. Its patented compact structure provides short pipelines, a smaller footprint, and is designed to prevent the accumulation of sediments. The detailed RAS design is scheduled to begin this summer, while the construction start date of the Millinocket facility, initially scheduled for next spring, was finally set for the summer of 2025.
