Proponents of land-based salmon farm host first public consultation

Proponents of land-based salmon farm host first public consultation

On Thursday evening (February 13), the company planning a land-based Atlantic salmon farm in Litchfield held a public consultation at the Campbell’s Bay RA Hall, with about 30 members of the public in attendance, including several elected officials.

Samonix is a company based in Chelsea Quebec, that has already purchased property for the planned farm in the Litchfield industrial park, the former site of the Smurfit-Stone pulp mill. The proposed goal is to create a large indoor farm for raising approximately 10,000 tons/year of Atlantic Salmon using a recirculating aquaculture system (RAS), which filters and recirculates the vast majority of water within the system.

After an introduction from Rémi Bertrand, the company’s development director, President Mathieu Farley spoke at length. A property developer from Chelsea with a background in accounting, Farley said the idea of land-based production of salmon was appealing due to the commonly-used open-net pen system falling out of favour due to environmental reasons.

Farley also presented a rough timeline for the project, noting that they plan to submit their environmental report in March, with the process to go through Quebec’s public environmental consultation bureau for large projects, known as the BAPE.  He estimated that if successful, the environmental approvals would take a minimum of 12 to 16 months, with plans for the facility taking another year after that.

During the public question period, many of the questions had to do with the treatment of wastewater produced by the facility. Portage-du-Fort Mayor Lynne Cameron, whose municipality sits just downstream from the proposed site, said that her residents were concerned about the potential impacts on their drinking water. Samonix Technical Director Fred Briscoe gave a detailed breakdown of the wastewater treatment process and the monitoring efforts that they will have in place.

Other questions included the amount of testing that is done on the effluent, the potential impacts from Chalk River Nuclear Laboratories upriver, as well as the project’s financing.

More information can be found on Samonix’s website.