Two letters to the editor that were published November 26, 2020, The first is by Amy Grant, President of Upstream Watch; the second by Belfast citizen Lawrence Reichard
1. Questions remain in Nordic permit processNordic Aquafarms’ permitting process with the Department of Environmental Protection is far from over. Board of Environmental Protection member Susan Lessard stated that “this isn’t a period at the end of a sentence but more like three dots.” Nordic has a very steep slope ahead of them to meet the multiple conditions the Department of Environmental Protection requested. Given the opportunity for appeals on many of the permit conditions, this process will drag on for years.
We look forward to getting this in front of a judge and will be filing our appeal in the coming days. The BEP has granted permits that were incomplete and instead is letting Nordic fill in the blanks after the fact. That approach is both illogical and illegal.
The DEP has asked for multiple conditions which would normally be required before permits get approved. Board members questioned the wisdom of applying conditions at the same time as issuing permits, but in the end all votes were unanimous without discussion, suggesting that the vote was predetermined.
At least 12 of the conditions on the site location of development application permit open the door for further appeals that require public hearings. Upstream is fortunate to have a strong science-based team in place to see this process through, however long that may take. Upstream will continue to stand with the need for much more conclusive data and clear answers before construction begins.
The law says that conditions can only be used for minor and easily fixable issues and they are not interchangeable with permit requirements. Permit conditions are allowed to assure compliance with the permit, not to qualify for a permit after the project is constructed. Nordic still has a lot of questions to answer.
By Amy Grant, President, Upstream Watch, Belfast
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2. The BEP's fatal flawsLast week the Maine Board of Environmental Protection approved permits for Nordic Aquafarms' industrial fish farm.
In its decision, BEP ignored and violated many of its own rules and regulations by not requiring Nordic to perform legally mandated studies. Apparently the board is happy to fly blind with the future of Belfast Bay and the woods, wetlands and wildlife habitat Nordic seeks to destroy.
The BEP decision has at least two fatal flaws. Before it can even apply for BEP permits, Nordic must by law establish title, right and interest to all lands it intends to use, but BEP chose to completely ignore very substantial problems with Nordic's TRI. It's ludicrous to rule that Nordic has sufficient TRI while Nordic's TRI is being litigated in court — especially when a Maine court recently ruled that active litigation by definition obviates TRI. The BEP chose to utterly ignore this.
The second flaw is the question of Nordic's competence — or incompetence. As an official BEP intervenor who has repeatedly documented significant Nordic incompetencies, I was barred from addressing these incompetencies in my testimony.
This, too, is ludicrous. As city of Belfast attorney Bill Kelly has urged the Belfast Planning Board to do, the BEP focused exclusively on the viability of Nordic's design, not the company's ability to actually follow that design competently. That's like buying a perfectly viable new Ford and then handing the keys to your 4-year-old child.
Perhaps the worst of all this is that no BEP member lives in Belfast or Northport. Thus none of them will have to live with the consequences of allowing Nordic to daily spew at least 7.7 million gallons of effluent into Belfast Bay, to annually devour at least 630 million gallons of our freshwater, and to destroy our woods, wetlands, wildlife habitat and hiking trails.
With its Nordic decision, the BEP has failed to protect our environment and has failed the people of Maine — all for the sake of wealthy corporate executives and stockholders, and high-end consumers. Let's hope our courts don't follow suit.
By Lawrence Reichard, Belfast
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