Separating FACT from FICTION
Separating FACT from FICTION
Bricks and Mortars
Lawrence Reichard
On November 1, the day before I was ordered by Courier Publications, owner of The Republican Journal, to stop writing about Nordic Aquafarms, The Republican Journal published a full-page ad by Nordic Aquafarms entitled "Let's Separate FACTS from FEAR."
The ad came fully 13 months after Nordic first approached the city about its desire to build in Belfast a very big industrial fish farm - or factory - and the fact that it took Nordic that long to figure out the benefits of taking out such big, expensive ads in Belfast's only newspaper is yet more evidence that Nordic suffers from poor management and has little idea what it's doing.
In any event, the ad deserves a response from our community.
The ad says Nordic will "bring important new tax dollars to Belfast," but every indication is that these tax dollars will be far fewer than Nordic and the City of Belfast would have one believe.
First Nordic is taking advantage of various tax breaks proffered by the City of Belfast and the State of Maine. On top of that, the city is giving Nordic sweetheart deals such as paying for half of Nordic's dechlorination costs. As I have pointed out before, the city has made no such offer to Marshall Wharf brewing company, a locally owned and operated business that has served this community for more than ten years.
Nordic has U.S. operations only in Belfast, and yet it has incorporated in Delaware, and this may serve to minimize its tax bill.
Nordic has in the past employed the global consulting firm of Deloitte, and Nordic Chief Operations Officer Marianne Naess has worked for Ernst & Young. Deloitte and Ernst & Young are two of what the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists calls "The Big Four," the world's four biggest firms for helping corporations, the rich and the super-rich avoid taxes by stashing their wealth, often illegally, in offshore bank accounts.
Taken together, this paints a picture of a company that is likely to go to considerable lengths to minimize its taxes and maximize concessions from state and local government - indeed it already has.
What is more, any taxes that Belfast does manage to receive from Nordic will be cut roughly in half by the state school-funding formula.
The ad says Nordic will "create good paying jobs for the future." The ad cites a figure of "more than 100 jobs." When Nordic publicly announced its Belfast plans in February, Nordic said it would create about 60 jobs. Then the figure migrated to 60-100 jobs. And now, apparently, it is "more than 100 jobs."
This ever-expanding jobs number is reminiscent of Nordic's Incredible Shrinking Pipe, its effluent discharge pipe that has shrunk from 1.5 miles in length to one mile, to one kilometer (.62 miles) - and that includes its on-land length. The in-water length is estimated by Carol DiBello of the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry to be only 1,900 feet. And more than a month after publicly announcing the pipe's shortening to one kilometer, the Nordic Aquafarms website still pegs the pipe's length at one mile.
It would seem that either Nordic is inflating its jobs numbers in the face of mounting opposition to its plans, or, again, it doesn't really know what it's doing.
And it bears pointing out that to date Nordic has hired few if any Belfast or even Waldo County residents.
In true Orwellian fashion, the ad states that Nordic will "preserve and protect the Little River Trails." First of all, it is only one trail. And Nordic will not "preserve and protect" the trail - it will destroy the trail as a genuine woods experience. Nordic's massive industrial fish farm will clearcut and pave over up to 70% of the 56 acres it is set to purchase, and in the process Nordic will eliminate 15 tons of annual carbon sequestration. A video on Nordic's website clearly shows its massive fish tanks coming within a few trees of the Little River Trail. So much for the "substantial green buffers" cited in the ad. Building a massive concentrated feeding operation within a few yards of a trail does not "preserve and protect" the trail.
The ad refers to "a small group of opponents, many of whom don't even live in Belfast." As Nordic opponent Lew McGregor points out, you can't have "many" in a small group. Which is it, a small group or many?
But never mind that, there is considerable evidence that a majority or even a large majority of Belfast and Waldo County residents are against Nordic's plans. When I spoke with state legislature candidate Jan Dodge, she had knocked on 1,725 doors. Of those, she said 15% saw Nordic as an important or very important issue, and of those 80% were opposed to Nordic.
In an email to Nordic CEO Erik Heim, Belfast City Manager Joe Slocum told Heim the city had received 143 letters opposed to Nordic - no mention is made of any letters supporting Nordic, despite Slocum's obvious eagerness to please Heim.
And in meeting after meeting, public sentiment runs 95-100% against Nordic.
As for who doesn't live in Belfast, Nordic CEO Erik Heim doesn't live in Belfast. Nor does Nordic Chief Operations Officer Marianne Naess. They both live in Portland, and until recently they lived in Norway. And little if any of the city administration that is pushing hard for the Nordic project lives in Belfast, or even Waldo County.
The ad states that Nordic "won't pollute the bay." The fact is that by Nordic's own numbers, it will pump 7.7 million gallons of treated water per day into Belfast Bay, and it will dump 1,600 pounds of nitrogen per day into the bay. That's more than 11 times the amount of all of Belfast.
The ad states that Nordic "won't drain aquifers and hurt nearby wells," but Dr. Mark Gold, UCLA Associate Vice Chancellor for Environment and Sustainability, told me in an email that in the face of climate change, one cannot predict the future performance of aquifers and that a project of this size could endanger Belfast's water supply.
The ad states that Nordic "will use the latest bio-security measures...to ensure that our fish, as well as the water coming into and going out of our facility, are disease-free." But 30-year University of Bergen, Norway professor Dr. Are Nyland told me there is no way to guarantee there will be no disease, and Dr. Anders Karlsson-Drangsholt of Norway's Bellon Foundation told me that land-based is too young an industry to know whether there will be a disease problem. Indeed, Nordic CEO Erik Heim told me in his Norway office September 19 that there is no guarantee there won't be disease.
And according to the designer, builder and former owner of Nordic's land-based Maximus fish farm in Denmark, and according to a former Maximus worker, that plant has had problems with disease, a charge Nordic denies.
Finally, the ad states that Nordic "won't be experimenting at your expense." But no one has ever built a land-based salmon farm as big as what Nordic proposes for Belfast, and by Nordic's own statement, its fish tanks would be the biggest in the world. Nordic's proposed Belfast operation would be more than six times as big as Nordic's only existing operation. I will let you, the reader, decide whether that sounds experimental.
To see more previously published Bricks and Mortars columns, please go to:
https://waldo.villagesoup.com/p/bricks-and-mortars/1233098
Bricks and Mortars
Lawrence Reichard
On November 1, the day before I was ordered by Courier Publications, owner of The Republican Journal, to stop writing about Nordic Aquafarms, The Republican Journal published a full-page ad by Nordic Aquafarms entitled "Let's Separate FACTS from FEAR."
The ad came fully 13 months after Nordic first approached the city about its desire to build in Belfast a very big industrial fish farm - or factory - and the fact that it took Nordic that long to figure out the benefits of taking out such big, expensive ads in Belfast's only newspaper is yet more evidence that Nordic suffers from poor management and has little idea what it's doing.
In any event, the ad deserves a response from our community.
The ad says Nordic will "bring important new tax dollars to Belfast," but every indication is that these tax dollars will be far fewer than Nordic and the City of Belfast would have one believe.
First Nordic is taking advantage of various tax breaks proffered by the City of Belfast and the State of Maine. On top of that, the city is giving Nordic sweetheart deals such as paying for half of Nordic's dechlorination costs. As I have pointed out before, the city has made no such offer to Marshall Wharf brewing company, a locally owned and operated business that has served this community for more than ten years.
Nordic has U.S. operations only in Belfast, and yet it has incorporated in Delaware, and this may serve to minimize its tax bill.
Nordic has in the past employed the global consulting firm of Deloitte, and Nordic Chief Operations Officer Marianne Naess has worked for Ernst & Young. Deloitte and Ernst & Young are two of what the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists calls "The Big Four," the world's four biggest firms for helping corporations, the rich and the super-rich avoid taxes by stashing their wealth, often illegally, in offshore bank accounts.
Taken together, this paints a picture of a company that is likely to go to considerable lengths to minimize its taxes and maximize concessions from state and local government - indeed it already has.
What is more, any taxes that Belfast does manage to receive from Nordic will be cut roughly in half by the state school-funding formula.
The ad says Nordic will "create good paying jobs for the future." The ad cites a figure of "more than 100 jobs." When Nordic publicly announced its Belfast plans in February, Nordic said it would create about 60 jobs. Then the figure migrated to 60-100 jobs. And now, apparently, it is "more than 100 jobs."
This ever-expanding jobs number is reminiscent of Nordic's Incredible Shrinking Pipe, its effluent discharge pipe that has shrunk from 1.5 miles in length to one mile, to one kilometer (.62 miles) - and that includes its on-land length. The in-water length is estimated by Carol DiBello of the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry to be only 1,900 feet. And more than a month after publicly announcing the pipe's shortening to one kilometer, the Nordic Aquafarms website still pegs the pipe's length at one mile.
It would seem that either Nordic is inflating its jobs numbers in the face of mounting opposition to its plans, or, again, it doesn't really know what it's doing.
And it bears pointing out that to date Nordic has hired few if any Belfast or even Waldo County residents.
In true Orwellian fashion, the ad states that Nordic will "preserve and protect the Little River Trails." First of all, it is only one trail. And Nordic will not "preserve and protect" the trail - it will destroy the trail as a genuine woods experience. Nordic's massive industrial fish farm will clearcut and pave over up to 70% of the 56 acres it is set to purchase, and in the process Nordic will eliminate 15 tons of annual carbon sequestration. A video on Nordic's website clearly shows its massive fish tanks coming within a few trees of the Little River Trail. So much for the "substantial green buffers" cited in the ad. Building a massive concentrated feeding operation within a few yards of a trail does not "preserve and protect" the trail.
The ad refers to "a small group of opponents, many of whom don't even live in Belfast." As Nordic opponent Lew McGregor points out, you can't have "many" in a small group. Which is it, a small group or many?
But never mind that, there is considerable evidence that a majority or even a large majority of Belfast and Waldo County residents are against Nordic's plans. When I spoke with state legislature candidate Jan Dodge, she had knocked on 1,725 doors. Of those, she said 15% saw Nordic as an important or very important issue, and of those 80% were opposed to Nordic.
In an email to Nordic CEO Erik Heim, Belfast City Manager Joe Slocum told Heim the city had received 143 letters opposed to Nordic - no mention is made of any letters supporting Nordic, despite Slocum's obvious eagerness to please Heim.
And in meeting after meeting, public sentiment runs 95-100% against Nordic.
As for who doesn't live in Belfast, Nordic CEO Erik Heim doesn't live in Belfast. Nor does Nordic Chief Operations Officer Marianne Naess. They both live in Portland, and until recently they lived in Norway. And little if any of the city administration that is pushing hard for the Nordic project lives in Belfast, or even Waldo County.
The ad states that Nordic "won't pollute the bay." The fact is that by Nordic's own numbers, it will pump 7.7 million gallons of treated water per day into Belfast Bay, and it will dump 1,600 pounds of nitrogen per day into the bay. That's more than 11 times the amount of all of Belfast.
The ad states that Nordic "won't drain aquifers and hurt nearby wells," but Dr. Mark Gold, UCLA Associate Vice Chancellor for Environment and Sustainability, told me in an email that in the face of climate change, one cannot predict the future performance of aquifers and that a project of this size could endanger Belfast's water supply.
The ad states that Nordic "will use the latest bio-security measures...to ensure that our fish, as well as the water coming into and going out of our facility, are disease-free." But 30-year University of Bergen, Norway professor Dr. Are Nyland told me there is no way to guarantee there will be no disease, and Dr. Anders Karlsson-Drangsholt of Norway's Bellon Foundation told me that land-based is too young an industry to know whether there will be a disease problem. Indeed, Nordic CEO Erik Heim told me in his Norway office September 19 that there is no guarantee there won't be disease.
And according to the designer, builder and former owner of Nordic's land-based Maximus fish farm in Denmark, and according to a former Maximus worker, that plant has had problems with disease, a charge Nordic denies.
Finally, the ad states that Nordic "won't be experimenting at your expense." But no one has ever built a land-based salmon farm as big as what Nordic proposes for Belfast, and by Nordic's own statement, its fish tanks would be the biggest in the world. Nordic's proposed Belfast operation would be more than six times as big as Nordic's only existing operation. I will let you, the reader, decide whether that sounds experimental.
To see more previously published Bricks and Mortars columns, please go to:
https://waldo.villagesoup.com/p/bricks-and-mortars/1233098
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Lawrence Reichard
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