Press release: Nordic leaves Belfast but justice is still due

[Friday, January 17, 2025. Belfast, Maine] Earlier today, Nordic Aquafarms, Inc. announced that it is abandoning its plans for a 900,000 square-foot salmon-raising factory on the banks of the Little River in Belfast. This is good news indeed! Credit for stopping the company from building its facility goes to everyone who testified against it at public hearings, donated to citizen action organizations that mobilized to defend the Penobscot Bay and Maine's midcoast, wrote letters to newspapers, or talked with friends and neighbors about the long-term damage such an industrial enterprise can do. While Nordic intends to put its Belfast properties up for sale, the array of legal actions against the company taken by landowners Jeffrey Mabee and Judith Grace, the Friends of Harriet L. Hartley Conservation Area, and Upstream Watch still need to be settled. Those cases and any negotiations to settle them will be arduous and intensely demanding. How willing Nordic is to fairly compensate the people who suffered the most from the company's stubborn campaign of regulatory manipulation, self-serving public relations, and legalized bullying will tell us much about the lasting legacy of this "Nordic saga."

-- Andrew Stevenson, Press Secretary,

The Friends of Harriet L. Hartley Conservation Area