Scottish Sea Farms drops appeal over hatchery discharges
Scottish Sea Farms has abandoned a legal appeal against a notice preventing it from discharging water with antifungal agents into a sea loch – because the notice has been lifted.
The suspension notice was issued by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) to prevent discharges of water containing formaldehyde and bronopol, from the Scottish Sea Farms hatchery at Barcaldine, being released into Loch Creran.
The notice was issued in April this year, following an outbreak of the freshwater fungal disease saprolegnia in the hatchery in 2024. It had come to SEPA’s attention that, in the course of treating the pathogen, Scottish Sea Farms had breached its conditions for the permitted amount of the agents used. SEPA said that the company had also failed to report the discharges as it was required to do.
Saprolegnia is a deadly disease for fish and, according the figures from the Scottish Fish Health Inspectorate it claimed the lives of more than 671,000 salmon at Barcaldine during 2024.
Scottish Sea Farms had lodged an appeal against the suspension notice and a hearing had been due to be held on 2 October. Several groups, including campaigning body the Friends of Loch Creran, had been planning to object to the appeal.
Now, it seems, the suspension notice has been lifted after SEPA and Scottish Sea Farms were able to agree a way forward.
A SEPA spokesperson told the Oban Times: “SEPA issued a suspension notice on April 22 2025, the effect of which was that Scottish Sea Farms Limited could not discharge water containing medicines with active ingredients formaldehyde and bronopol to the water environment, in light of significant and prolonged breaches of the relevant parts of its authorisation during May 2024 to November last year.
“Following receipt of additional information and assurances from Scottish Sea Farms Limited, including updated details regarding the causes of the previous outbreak of disease; steps taken to mitigate the risk of a future outbreak; and steps taken to ensure its response to a future outbreak of disease would not involve a breach of its authorisation, SEPA no longer considers that the suspension notice is necessary.
“SEPA and Scottish Sea Farms Limited have agreed a managed outcome which proportionately protects the environment and involves Scottish Sea Farms Limited providing further reports and assurances regarding future contingency planning.”
Commenting on the case, Dale Vince, a businessman and founder Dale Vince, Founder of the Green Britain Foundation, which is opposed to fish farming, said that after legal discharge limits were breached on more than 200 days last year at Barcaldine, the suspension notice should not have been lifted.
He commented: “SEPA has given Scottish Sea Farms the green light to start dumping its toxic waste back into Loch Creran - one of Scotland’s natural wonders. This is madness. Prolonged, Wilful and Significant - is how these breaches have been described by the agency tasked with protecting the environment. Hundreds of days of dumping toxic chemicals at up to ten times the legal limit - how does that get waived away?”
It is not clear, however, that lifting the suspension notice entails any implied permission to breach legal limits for future discharges.
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