A Norwegian company plans to build a fish-farming operation at the former Bainbridge naval base west of Newark on the western edge of Cecil County, MD.
Cecil County's Office of Economic Development announced the project from AquaCon via a social media post. (See below)
It comes after decades of efforts by the county and state to redevelop the site on the upper edge of Chesapeake Bay and mouth of Susquehanna River about 20 miles west of Newark.
The proposed $320 million capital investment would be built in two phases, beginning next year.
The project did not come with a formal announcement from the State of Maryland, which often offers financial incentives for large-scale projects.
The project would face scrutiny from environmentalists and regulators. A similar project from Aqua Con on the lower Eastern Shore was shelved over treated water discharges into a creek and Bay over fears that waste might put further pressure on a struggling sturgeon population.
The Oslo company has stated that wastewater would be treated to the point that it would be purer than the water going into indoor salmon-farming tanks.
If the project gets past environmental hurdles, it would represent another big win for Cecil County, which saw the construction and opening of the quarter of a billion dollar Great Wolf waterpark resort and several logistics-warehouse center projects.
Cecil County - which once had one of Maryland's highest jobless rate with many residents taking jobs in neighboring Delaware or the Baltimore area - now has one of the Free State's lowest unemployment figures.
The county is in a strategic location along the I-95 corridor and tens of millions of East Coast residents.
Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd,
racist or sexually-oriented language. PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK. Don't Threaten. Threats of harming another
person will not be tolerated. Be Truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone
or anything. Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism
that is degrading to another person. Be Proactive. Use the 'Report' link on
each comment to let us know of abusive posts. Share with Us. We'd love to hear eyewitness
accounts, the history behind an article.
(0) comments
Welcome to the discussion.
Log In
Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Don't Threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be Truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism that is degrading to another person.
Be Proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
Share with Us. We'd love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article.