PIONEER, Ohio — After years of debate and some opposition from the community, construction of a northwest Ohio commercial salmon farm is underway.
A groundbreaking was held in Pioneer Wednesday morning at the site of AquaBounty's future salmon farm.
The 10,000-metric-ton facility will be eight times larger than AquaBounty's current facilities in Indiana, and will employ more than 100 workers.
"Land based recirculating agriculture, or RAS systems, really are going to take the strain off of wild caught populations. We need both, but it allows us to bring it to an agricultural oriented community in a way that we didn't have the opportunity to do before," AquaBounty President and CEO Sylvia Wulf said.
Wulf said after looking at hundreds of locations across the country, setting up a farm in Pioneer made the most sense.
"We love the fact that Ohio is an agriculturally state, and we thought that Pioneer is the type of community that would be receptive, and that we could make a positive impact on," Wulf said.
To date, the total economic investment is approaching $320 million, the largest ever for Williams County. And though the facility isn't even up and running yet, officials say project is already having a positive impact on the community.
"The people working on the site, the people working here, they're going to go to restaurants, they're going to shop local. The impact up and down the chain is just truly tremendous for Williams County, and the region." said Megan Hausch, Williams County economic development director.
And along with the additional tax revenue, and sustainable fish supply, the AquaBounty facility will also will mean more tax revenue for North Central school district for the next decade and a half.
"The estimates are between $750,000 and $1 million a year for the next 15 years. So again, it's not going to change our small-town atmosphere, but we're going to have a lot more dollars to pass around," Pioneer Mayor Edward Kidston said.
The project was not without some controversy as some residents voiced concerns about the amount of water the project will use and the safety of the genetically engineered salmon it will produce. Williams County Alliance, a group that also opposed plans to tap the region's Michindoh aquifer to provide water to Toledo and its suburbs, also has questioned the AquaBounty project.
Protestors from the group gathered during the groundbreaking.
"The people living over the Michindoh Aquifer understand that water is life. Yet the state of Ohio continues to treat the Michindoh Aquifer as nothing more than a commodity to be exploited for profit," Sherry Fleming, chairperson of the Williams County Alliance, said in a statement provided to WTOL 11 after the groundbreaking.
Construction for the aquaculture facility is already underway and is expected to possibly be finished sometime late summer or fall of next year, with the first round of salmon eggs being brought in late in the fourth quarter of 2023.
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