Aerial view of Kingfish Maine's proposed aquaculture facility.
Photo: The Kingfish Company.
"Kingfish Maine remains a fully-permitted project." So headlined The Kingfish Company's announcement of its latest court victory - yet another - over its opponent, the activist group Protect Downeast. The court has denied the last appeal of the opposition group, facilitating a new step forward for the future land-based yellowtail farm in Jonesport, Maine, the U.S.
If there is one thing that all the companies that have decided to start land-based farming fish in the United States agree on, this is how complicated it is to get through the permitting phase, and not only because of legislation. In addition to national, state, municipal, and, of course, environmental legislation, almost without exception - although there is always the exception that proves the rule - there are also the demands of opposition groups.
This is the case of Protect Downeast, known for its fight against several aquaculture projects in the area chosen by The Kingfish Company for its U.S. land-based fish farm. The organization describes itself as a group that "works to ensure the health and well-being of this special area of the Maine coast." The group has already filed multiple appeals to the permits issued for the land-based recirculating aquaculture project (RAS) but, to date, all ruled appeals have been denied.
In the face of their insistence, the land-based yellowtail farmer - whose project has been fully approved since 2022 - has always maintained that it is not concerned about this opposition group, stressing that it is Roque Island Gardner Homestead Corporation (RIGHC) - the family-owned company that owns the Roque archipelago, separate from the site chosen by Kingfish Maine by Chandler Bay - that is behind the protest.
The latest Protect Downeast's appeal was heard before Maine's Business and Consumer Court which, by written decision earlier this week, rejected every one of its arguments and, as said, denied the appeal. In doing so, the Maine court found in favor of the town of Jonesport and Kingfish Maine, and upheld the permits issued by the Planning Board under the town’s Land Use Development Ordinance and Shoreland Zoning Ordinance.
"We are encouraged by the court's decision to deny another appeal by Protect Downeast. Our permits stand on a factual and scientific basis that we adhere to all requirements set forth by the Town of Jonesport," said Vincent Erenst, The Kingfish Company CEO commenting on the ruling. "We thank the community for the continued support of our project."
Erenst is not the first CEO of The Kingfish Company to acknowledge Jonesport's continued support of the project. After learning that all permits were in order, his predecessor, Ohad Maiman, recalled that from the submission of their project to the city three years earlier to the final building permit approval in December 2022, they had received "overwhelming support from Jonesport residents." Support that shortly thereafter was also emphasized by former Kingfish Maine Operations Manager Megan Sorby in an interview with WeAreAquaculture. "The town wants Kingfish," she told us.
As said, this latest appeal won in court is a step forward for the project, but there are still some legal battles to be contested, including one for the environmental permits issued by the state for Kingfish Maine that were ratified by the Maine Board of Environmental Protection and the Maine Superior Court in August 2023, but which, again, were appealed by Protect Downeast.
The land-based yellowtail farmer awaits a decision on that separate appeal in the Maine Supreme Judicial Court in the coming months. If, as has happened so far, the Protect Downeast appeal of the state permit is denied, the activists will have exhausted all their options on state permits.
However, despite all these permitting issues, the company has already begun operations. While it prepares for construction of its recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) facility in Jonesport, Kingfish Maine is currently operating at the University of Maine's Center for Cooperative Aquaculture Research (CCAR) in Franklin, where just over a year ago it had a successful first harvest. Once the facility is fully operational, the U.S. subsidiary of The Kingfish Company is projected to produce 8,500 metric tons of yellowtail.
