Aquacultured UK's plans for a 40,000 square metre land-based salmon farm in Grimsby, UK, are to be approved by local authorities this week.
The facility, to be built in the operational port area of the Grimsby waterfront, is projected to produce 5,000 tonnes of salmon per year once fully operational, and create up to 100 jobs.
The project represents an investment of £75 million, and is described as a "first of its kind" in England, at a scale making it one of the UK's largest land-based aquaculture projects.
The North East Lincolnshire Council planning committee is meeting on 29 November to consider the planning application, but have already released documents stating they will approve the proposals.
Some objections have been lodged by local residents largely due to environmental concerns, but the Council has said it believes the facility “would not cause harm to residential amenities or business amenity, the visual character of the area, drainage and flood risk, highway safety and amenity, the Humber Estuary designations, the onsite biodiversity and local wildlife site allocation.”
Instead, the planning committee outlined economic benefits to the local area if the land-based salmon farm goes ahead.
“The proposal would represent a significant economic investment into the area, creating a number of jobs through construction and then operation as well as supporting the food processing and manufacturing businesses in the area," the planning committee report states.
Grimsby is the main seafood processing hub in the UK, with total sales of product processed or traded in Grimsby of approximately £2 billion (€2.26 billion/$2.4 billion). The Grimsby Seafood Processing Cluster is the largest in Northern Europe and one of the largest in the Northern Hemisphere. The cluster employs nearly 6,000 people directly in over 50 approved seafood processing factories and trading businesses.
Aquacultured UK, the company behind the project, says they selected the Grimsby port site "due to strong local knowledge of fish and food processing, proximity to existing, established food and waste processors and access to fresh and saline water sources."
Aquacultured UK's Grimsby salmon farm is to include freshwater and saltwater tanks for raising salmon, in addition to a water treatment plant, a fish processing line and a feed storage unit. The facility will also incorporate an on-site energy centre, and a dedicated area for bio-security and disinfection.
Owned by Associated British Ports (ABP), the shoreline site was previously used for rail sidings for dockside fish freight, and more recently as a storage area for flood defence works.
