It's been a busy week at the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). On Monday DEP announced it won't fine chronic environmental offender Cooke Aquaculture for a massive fish die-off at its industrial fish farm off Mount Desert Island. In making the announcement, DEP said Cooke's failure to report the incident for a week wasn't a DEP violation, and that in fact Cooke wasn't obligated to report it all.

And therein lies the problem. How can Cooke not be required to pick up the phone and report this?

Also this week, the Maine Monitor reported September 26 that DEP has proposed that Sprague Resources of New Hampshire be fined $17,800 for a December 2020 spill of 2,500 pounds of shredded paper and plastic in marine waters off Searsport. According to the Monitor, Sprague didn't report the spill for a week - after the DEP received a report of plastics in the waters around Sears Island.

The proposed Sprague fine is a joke. In 2019, Sprague posted profits of $230 million, which makes fining Sprague $17,800 the equivalent of fining an average American $2.40. 

Meanwhile in Belfast, Nordic Aquafarms and the City of Belfast have been assuring the public that DEP will vigorously monitor the $500 million industrial fish farm Nordic has proposed for Belfast, and that DEP will hold Nordic's accountable for any environmental violations.

But DEP's enforcement record is abysmal. 

Never mind the Sprague Resources slap on the wrist, in 2019 DEP fined Cooke Aquaculture $156,000 for multiple violations. The year before, in 2018, Cooke had revenues of $2.4 billion. That fine was like fining an average American two bucks. And now, violation or not, Cooke dragged its feet for a week before reporting its massive fish die-off. This is not encouraging.

Clearly the soothing assurances from the City of Belfast and Nordic Aquafarms of vigorous DEP monitoring and enforcement are worthless. The DEP is toothless, and we can expect more corporate fouling of our marine waters as long as DEP continues to issue comical, window-dressing fines. 

Lawrence Reichard lives in Belfast