Violations lead to the termination of Atlantic salmon net pen lease

Multiple violations prompted state officials to terminate the lease of Cooke Aquaculture Pacific Atlantic salmon net-pen farm in Port Angeles.

According to Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz, the Aug. 19 net pen collapse at Cooke’s Cypress Island site in Port Angeles prompted her to direct the Department of Natural Resources to inspect each of Cooke’s four net pen facilities.

“After the collapse of Cooke’s Cypress Island net pen in August, which released 160,000 non-native salmon into our waters, I directed my staff to inspect every net pen site in the state to ensure that Cooke was meeting its contractual obligations and that our waters are safe,” Franz said.

An inspection this month revealed serious safety concerns at the Port Angeles site.

“Cooke Aquaculture was very aware that we were inspecting every one of their facilities following the incident at Cypress,” Franz said. “And, frankly, I am very surprised. Two of the violations … one being outside the boundary area that was pursuant to the lease, as well as encapsulating the flotation material that is made of Styrofoam to prevent it leaching into the water. Both of those items were required to be fixed by October 2016 — over a year ago.”

Franz is surprised by the violations, particularly because Cooke had a significant amount of time to remedy the issue.

“Especially in light of the Cypress violation and the breach of that facility and the magnitude of the impact it has had. To me, it is surprising that these pieces of the requirement that were part of the lease were not fixed; as well as the context of the facility and having the anchoring system not in good working order which led to the Cypress break down. To also have that occurring at Port Angeles is very disheartening and disturbing.”

The Department of Natural Resources inspection this month revealed serious safety concerns at the Port Angeles site:

• Cooke’s net pens are still outside of the leasehold.
• Two of the net pens’ anchor chains are not connected, and a third has an open link which is vulnerable to complete failure.
• Cooke has failed to replace unencapsulated flotation material in order to prevent Styrofoam from leaching into the environment.

Commissioner Franz says the decision is final with no room for negotiation.

The farm currently holds about 700,000 Atlantic salmon.

Franz says the Washington Department of Natural Resources will work with Cooke Aquaculture and other state agencies to complete an orderly shutdown and removal of the farm.

“The facility has an enormous amount of equipment. It has waste. It has biological material. These are pretty significant facilities with a lot of infrastructure. We are going to be working closely with them to make sure that as they are dismantling the facility in response to our termination letter that they do it in a safe and effective manner so they are not threatening public health and safety or the environment.”

Franz says the lease they have with Cooke is very much like a landlord to tenant lease.

“So when a landlord is evicting a tenant they are responsible for removing their materials and stuff and they take the cost of doing that. So we are expecting Cooke to bear the cost of the removal of their equipment and facilities and the waste and biological materials that come with that and doing it in a way that meets our specific requests for ensuring the health of the public and the Puget Sound.”

Prior to the eviction at Port Angeles, the Department of Natural Resources had four leases with Cooke Aquaculture for the raising of Atlantic Salmon. Franz says all four leases were initiated in the 1980s and renewed in the early 2000s.

“The four leases we have, one is at Port Angeles which is the facility that we have issued a termination letter to Cooke, another is Cypress Island, the third is Rich Passage off of Bainbridge Island and the fourth is Hope Island.”

Franz said there are ongoing inspections at the other three locations to determine if there are any lease violations.

According to Franz, Cooke Aquaculture is an international company with operations all over the world.

“The Port Angeles facility itself produced about 6.5 million pounds of fish. The revenue of which the state was paid was 71,000 dollars. The production payment was on top of the base annual rate of $33,746 dollars. So total compensation to the state was about $104,785 dollars for the Port Angeles facility.”

Franz says all the revenue generated from these facilities goes for the restoration and protection of the Puget Sound and the native salmon habitat.

Cooke Aquaculture Pacific spokesman Joel Richardson says the company learned of the lease termination on Friday and is evaluating the decision.