Aquaculture appeal prompts protests
Proponents of Grieg NL salmon farm point to hundreds of jobs; others say the province is neglecting its duty to the environment
On one side of the street, bearing signs with slogans like “Our lives! Our decision!” and “Our future! Say yes!” a group of about 20 residents of the Burin Peninsula let their thoughts on the proposed Grieg NL salmon farm be known.
On the other side of the street, two people with a different point of view did the same. “Are we really fighting government to follow its own laws?” they asked with one placard. “Insanity: salmon farm feedlots spread disease,” read another sign.
The groups paced the sidewalks in front of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador Court of Appeal in St. John’s Thursday morning, where inside, a panel of judges was hearing an appeal of the decision to require the province to complete a comprehensive environmental assessment before allowing the aquaculture project to get underway.
Greig NL has proposed a salmon farm with 11 sea cage sites for the Placentia Bay area. The province approved it without a comprehensive environmental assessment, a decision that was struck down by Supreme Court Justice Gillian Butler.
The province is appealing Butler’s ruling, saying she failed to see it was reasonable to release the proposal from further assessment, since provincial and Fisheries and Oceans Canada legislation would prevent the project from causing environmental damage.
St. Lawrence Mayor Paul Pike was among those who took a chartered bus to St. John’s for the rally on Duckworth Street, and he told The Telegram his council is satisfied by the measures already taken by the government and the company when it comes to ensuring environmental protection.
“We’re comfortable with the fact that two levels of government approved this project, and we’re comfortable with the information that was required by Grieg to pass on to government,” Pike said. “We feel that is sufficient enough to let this project happen. We feel that this project will happen because of all the work that’s gone into ensuring the impact on the environment will be minimal, if any at all.”
Pike pointed to the jobs the proposed project is expected to create in the area: up to 500 jobs, he said, with about 200 in the St. Lawrence area alone. They’re badly needed, Pike said, adding the area is expecting a 20 per cent decline in population over the next two decades.
“We educate our children to move away. We’ve been doing that for years, but the magnitude of this project will certainly enable us to have our young people stay at home, enable them to get good-paying jobs and raise families, and that’s what we want. Our people are our most important resource, and we need to try and keep them at home. This project will enable people to have hope. It will breathe new life into the economy on the Burin Peninsula.”
Grieg NL hopes to produce 33,000 tonnes of salmon a year with the Placentia Bay project, which includes a $75-million nursery in Marystown that would raise fish for the sea cages.
The proposed project was registered by the Department of Environment and Conservation early last year, and five months later was released from having to carry out further environmental assessment by then-environment minister Perry Trimper.
That decision was quashed by the court in July of this year, after it was challenged by the Atlantic Salmon Federation.
The province announced in August it would appeal that ruling.
Last month, Grieg NL announced it would immediately launch an environmental assessment statement for the aquaculture project, “as a prudent business step,” but said it felt this was unnecessary from an environmental perspective.
“Grieg NL looks forward to resuming work on the project if the appeal is successful,” the company said in a written statement.
Brendon Kelly and Katie Kennedy were the two protesters on the street Thursday supporting the environmental assessment requirement, noting potential issues like sea lice and infectious salmon anemia.
The pair said they aren’t opposed to the project in general, just the way the province has gone about allowing it.
“I think it’s hilarious and sad that we have to be here to try and make government enforce its own legislation under the Environmental Protection Act,” Kelly said. “With Muskrat Falls, we’ve seen the government tends to favour the economy over the environment, and as far as votes go, yeah, that works every time, but the thing is we don’t have to destroy the environment to create money. We can do both. It’s as simply put as that.
“You can have economics and the environment work together and work beautifully together, and Newfoundland is the perfect place for that. We have all these resources, but we just seem to mess it up every single time. We can’t do it right the first time, we have to spend triple the amount of money and then go back to the drawing board and fix it. Do it right the first time, spend a few extra dollars, and don’t destroy the environment in the process.”