The Irish public, like the public all over the world where Norwegian style in-ocean fish farms set up shop, criticize fish farms for the same problems that everyone else does: sea lice, diseases, fish escapes, chemical pollution, released sewage, damage to wild salmon and, in their case, sea trout and so on.
The point is that in-ocean fish farms are old-tech dinosaurs that need to be on land, in closed containment with recirculating systems, sewage capture and energy production along with hydroponics.
The Galway Bay and Bantry Bay issues have been long standing flash points in Ireland for many years. Read the text, as it is in keeping with other citizen complaint in Ireland:
Letter to the
Editor, Inshore Ireland, Dec 2014 – Jan 2015 Issue
Dear Editor,
Please allow
me space in your magazine to reply to the outdated policies on salmon farming
by Donal Maguire and Benen Dallaghan of B.I. M in your August/September issue.
Donal Maguire is wrong to blame the anti-salmon farm
lobby for the low output of Irish salmon farm production. According to Marine
Institute records and other documents which we acquired under freedom of
information there is approximately 32,000 tonnes licenced capacity and
approximately 10 to 15,000 tonnes unlicensed capacity salmon farms operating
all along our west coast. The truth of the matter is that these salmon farms
were only able to produce less than 10,000 tonnes last year and 10, to 15,000
tonnes in previous years due to outbreaks of diseases such as Amoebic Gill
Disease (AGD), Pancreas Disease and infestations of sea lice.If there is approximately 47,000 tonnes of
licenced and unlicensed capacity already in existence and salmon farmers cant
even reach a 1/3 of this capacity why in Gods name do BIM insists that we need
another 15,000 tonne salmon farm in our beautiful iconic Galway Bay and another
5,000 tonnes each for Inis Bofin and Gola Island?
Contrary to
BIM,s assertion that the Irish coast is ideal for salmon farming our sea
temperature’s are now rising to approximately 21 degrees and according to
weather experts they may rise another 2 degrees over the next 10 years, these
high sea temperatures are ideal only for AGD and sea lice to multiply and for
high moralities in farmed salmon.
AGD is now
prevalent in nearly all salmon farms along the west coast (including BIM,s
flagship Clare Island) and is costings salmon farmers millions of euro to treat
their fish with fresh water which some of them have to take illegally (no
planning permission) from rivers and lakes, yet in the Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) compiled by BIM for the Galway Bay salmon farm there is no
mention of AGD or where the operator is going to get water to treat anything up
to 14.4 million farmed salmon (salmon farm capacity is 30,000 tonnes). This EIS
is now out of date and should be withdrawn.
BIM keep
telling everyone that the Galway Bay salmon farm is a deep sea salmon farm. The
dept of water at the Inverin Bank site is only 18 to 26 metres deep and the
Inis Oirr site only 30 metres deep,this is hardly deep sea.
Benen
Dallaghan says that ”The mass movement of water on these sites also serves to
maintain the pristine nature of such offshore environments”. Mr Dallaghan
cannot prove that statement to be fact as BIM themselves admit in the EIS
(model limitations page 188) that there is no proper model to determine what
will happen under a salmon farm until the salmon farm has been in place for a
period of time.
The EIS is
also out of date in relation to wave heights in Galway Bay as it states (page
165) and I quote ”It would be expected that significant wave heights would be
below 1 metre for approximately 80% of time while significant wave heights in
excess of 3 metres would occur during storm events only.” We now know that last
winters storms produced waves of 9.7 metres and over in Galway Bay (MI data)
which caused tens of millions of euro damage to property and infrastructure all
around Galway Bay. If there had been a salmon farm in Galway Bay during these
storms it would have been destroyed along with the salmon farm in Bantry Bay
which had similar type cages to those proposed for Galway Bay. A previous
salmon farm at the Inis Oirr site was destroyed by gales in the early 1990s
after being in operation for a short time.
Donal
Maguire says that ”One cannot have a tank reared organic salmon”. Why not?
Surly a salmon reared in a closed containment on land system that didn’t need
to be treated with pesticides to kill sea lice,didn’t need antibiotics to treat
diseases and wouldn’t cause any harm to wild salmon or sea trout would be more
organic than what is now being produced.
I believe
the reason BIM do not want closed containment on land salmon farms is because
the remit for these farms will go to some other Government Department other
than BIM as they (BIM) are a SEA fisheries department and not a LAND fisheries
department. BIM needs these sea cage salmon farms to justify their existence.
Minister
Simon Coveney needs to bypass the outdated thinking of those in BIM and embrace
the new technology that is out there in relation to RAS systems. Salmon farm
systems that all stake holders would be happy with.
Yours
sincerely,
Billy Smyth
Chairman Galway Bay Against Salmon Cages,