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Dedicated to protecting Downeast Maine

Protect Downeast works to ensure the health and well-being of this special area of the Maine coast. Our coalition works with fishermen and women, clammers, wormers, residents and all those who care about industrial scale development in the sunrise county. We inform and engage the public in a process that protects the economic future and environment of Downeast Maine.

Hearings and Filings

April 10, 2023: Court Filing

March 7, 2023: Board of Appeals decision

February 28 at 6 PM: Appeals Board Hearing on Kingfish application – ratification of earlier vote.

February 15 at 6 PM: Appeals Board Hearing on Kingfish application (held at the Peabody Memorial Library)

February 14 at 6 PM: Appeals Board Hearing on Kingfish application

January 31 at 6 PM: Appeals Board Hearing on Kingfish application

January 26, 2023: Jonesport Appeals Board Filing for Protect Downeast

January 17 at 7 PM: Planning Board Meeting

December 2, 2022: Jonesport Appeals Board Filing for Protect Downeast

Facts

Economic and fiscal facts

Pollution and discharge facts

Landings data

In the News

Kingfish Admission Document

In Kingfish’s own Admission Document, risks associated with their business are outlined for investors. These risks “include for instance oxygen depletion, diseases, viruses, bacteria, parasites, algae blooms and other contaminants”

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July 13, 2023
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Reasons to Protect Downeast Maine and Oppose Kingfish

Our Mission

The Kingfish project in Jonesport should be stopped for some very good reasons. This project will endanger our economy, environment, and the character of Doweast Maine. We will lose so much that we will never get back. Kingfish is about one thing – making money for foreign investors at the expense of Maine people. Maine has a history of being an extraction state whether it’s our water resources, mining or in this case our ocean and the ecosystem within it. We ask you to join with us so Jonesport’s people and traditional fisheries are protected and can continue to the benefit of all who live, work, and recreate on the water.

Economic

Kingfish has stated that all marine life in the daily 28 MGD of intake water, such as commercially valuable finfish eggs, shellfish spat, and lobster larvae, would be killed by the system. Source: Kingfish during a January 2022 Information session
 
Kingfish will discharge 1,580 pounds of nitrogen a day. Increased nitrogen can cause increased algal blooms and reduce water quality and degrade commercial fisheries. Source: pg. 20 in ME0037559 W009238-6F-A-N Proposed Draft Fact Sheet. 
 
Ocean acidification impacts the bottom line for fisheries, and Kingfish is proposing to significantly increase the acidification. Maine is already vulnerable to acidification: “In 2015, the first nationwide study showing the vulnerability of the $1 billion U.S. shellfish industry to ocean acidification revealed a number of hotspots: the Pacific Northwest, Long Island Sound, Narragansett Bay, Chesapeake Bay, the Gulf of Mexico, and areas off Maine and Massachusetts.” Source: MEDEPS Permit and NOAA. 

Environmental

Kingfish is proposing to discharge close to 1,580 pounds of nitrogen per day into our bay. Portland serves over 60,000 people and reduced its daily seasonal nitrogen-discharge to less than twice the amount of Kingfish’s proposal due to algal blooms, low dissolved oxygen levels, and eelgrass degradation. 
 
Changes in pH can wreak havoc on marine ecosystems, especially lobsters and shellfish.  
         
Kingfish would be sucking in 28 million gallons of water per day. Shellfish spat, lobster larvae, and finfish eggs would enter the facility. Kingfish acknowledged that they would “sterilize the water” and anything that came in with it. Source: Kingfish at a public meeting in January 2022.

Community Character

Our heritage fisheries are integral not only to Jonesport’s economy but also to its character as a community. We are a fishing community.  
 
Jonesport is also a quiet and peaceful area with breathtaking natural beauty. Jonesport is also a community where residents can enjoy outdoor recreation. Pollution from the facility and the impacts, such as algal blooms, could diminish the recreational experience. According to Estimated Annual Impacts from Harmful Algal Blooms, “many experts consider the economic impacts of harmful algal blooms on commercial fisheries to be minor in contrast with the size of the impacts on recreation and tourism” (page 46). 

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