Super-sized Scottish Salmon - 8,000 tonnes of trouble on the horizon!

[Download press release from the Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture as a PDF online here]

Exclusive documents obtained from the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) reveal secret plans to expand Scotland's salmon farming industry – including proposals for super-sized salmon farms producing up to 8,000 tonnes of farmed salmon. Today's Sunday Herald reports: "Outrage over secret plans to base world's biggest salmon farm in Scotland".

Read more via The Sunday Herald: "Outrage over secret plans to base world's biggest salmon farm in Scotland"

Read the FOI documents obtained by GAAIA from SEPA online here – including:

Read the memo from SEPA's Douglas Sinclair dated 4 May 2016 online here

An email to SEPA's CEO Terry A'Hearn dated 13 May 2016 included:

The "not in any sense secret" summary from SEPA dated 13 May 2016 included:

The SEPA memo dated 13 May 2016 continued:

A memo from SEPA's Douglas Sinclair to Marine Scotland's Willie Cowan and Alastair Mitchell included:

The "not so secret" memo from SEPA to Marine Scotland continued:

"This crazy 'experiment' would be the world's largest salmon farm and smash Scotland's pollution limits for salmon farms," said Don Staniford of the Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture. "If SEPA sanctions such stupidity in Scotland's already overcrowded coastal waters they would lose all credibility. Lest we forget that Norway – the world's leading salmon farming nation – has strict biomass limits of less than 1,000 tonnes compared to 2,500 tonnes in Scotland. Allowing salmon farms to expand to 8,000 tonnes would signal that SEPA has abandoned any pretence to environmental protection."

The Sunday Herald reported (5 February 2017):

"Faced with increasing problems of sea lice infestation, chemical pollution and infectious diseases common sense would dictate that salmon farming production decreases not increases," concluded Staniford. "Sadly, common sense is not a currency SEPA or the Scottish Government is used to dealing with when it comes to their unflinching support for salmon farming. A doubling of aquaculture by 2030 – as the industry and Government proposes – is a recipe for environmental disaster and will leave a lasting legacy of pollution."