Background
Acadia Aqua Farms applied in 2019 for a twenty-year aquaculture lease in Eastern Bay off Mount Desert Island to cultivate blue mussels. Its proposal included floating pipe-and-net gear, a transport vessel, and a floating raft to store a harvesting machine when it was not in use. After a public hearing, the Commissioner of Marine Resources approved a reduced 19.71-acre lease in October 2024, subject to conditions addressing vessel upgrades, power-washing equipment, visual effects, and lobster fishing.
Friends of Eastern Bay, an intervenor in the agency proceeding, challenged the approval under Maine Rule of Civil Procedure 80C. It argued that the Commissioner lacked authority to approve the storage raft, that the operation would unreasonably affect nearby Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory research through noise, and that the application should have been treated as a discharge application requiring Department of Environmental Protection permitting. The Business and Consumer Docket affirmed the agency decision.
The Court’s Holding
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed. It held that the Commissioner had authority under 12 M.R.S. § 6072 to approve the lease and its floating-raft component. The raft was an integral part of the proposed aquaculture operation because it stored harvesting equipment used in cultivating mussels. The court also held that neither the Natural Resources Protection Act nor the Bureau of Parks and Lands’ submerged-land leasing authority displaced the Commissioner’s authority; the relevant statutes exempted aquaculture activities authorized through a section 6072 lease.
The court further held that the agency applied the correct noise standard and that substantial evidence supported its findings. Neither the statute nor the governing rules required Acadia to provide specific decibel or vibration measurements; instead, they required reasonable, practicable noise-mitigation measures. Finally, the court upheld the non-discharge designation and the refusal to reopen the record for PFAS-related developments because the record contained no evidence that Acadia’s equipment contained or would release PFAS or PFOA.
Key Takeaways
- A floating structure used to store aquaculture harvesting equipment may be part of an authorized aquaculture operation.
- Maine’s aquaculture noise rules require reasonable mitigation, not proof of specified decibel limits.
- Speculation that equipment may contain and discharge PFAS does not require reclassifying a lease application or reopening the agency record.
Why It Matters
The decision confirms the breadth of the Marine Resources Commissioner’s authority to regulate structures and equipment integral to a leased aquaculture operation. It also underscores the deferential substantial-evidence review applied to agency findings on operational impacts, including disputed noise evidence.
For challengers, the ruling illustrates that generalized environmental concerns—without record evidence tying the proposed operation to an actual discharge—will not overcome an agency’s non-discharge classification.