Demolition of Atlantic Sapphire’s blaze-hit salmon RAS almost complete
Site will be ready for development in September if new operator can be found, says company co-founder Thue Holm
Demolition work at Atlantic Sapphire’s fire-damaged land-based salmon farm in Denmark is almost complete, paving the way for a new operator to take over the site if the company can find a buyer for the lease and remaining assets.
Thue Holm, a consultant in and co-founder of Atlantic Sapphire, gave an update on progress at the site on LinkedIn.
“Functional features like smolt production, water intake, storage, buffer tanks, a cooling system, and effluent treatment remain,” wrote Holm. “The site is backed by a 6,400 amps power supply and all required permits. It has potential as a post-smolt site for Northern European salmon farmers or other fish farming projects. Get in touch to explore opportunities.”
The recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) facility at Hvide Sande near Ringkjøbing, on Denmark’s west coast, was badly damaged by a fire in September 2021 that led to the deaths of all the fish being grown there.
The company still does not know how the fire started. In May last year Atlantic Sapphire announced that an insurance settlement for the blaze had been successfully concluded and that it had agreed on a cash settlement of DKK 180 million ($25.5m) which would be invested in its salmon RAS in Florida in the United States.
“The plan is that we will not build anything new in Denmark, but rather we are looking for someone else who wants to use the location,” Holm told the Tekset conference in Norway in February.
Cheaper than Norway
“We are in contact with several different long-term projects, there are also several who are interested in producing post-smolt in Denmark. One of the reasons for that is that it is cheaper to build in Denmark compared to Norway and that it is actually not that far from the location in Denmark to Norway. So, we try to hold up several different possibilities.”
This week Holm told one of Fish Farming Experts’s Norwegian sister sites, LandbasedAQ, that there hasn’t been much interest in the area so far, but pointed out that Atlantic Sapphire hadn’t been that active in trying the sell the site yet either.
Atlantic Sapphire is focused on expanding production at its Bluehouse in Miami-Dade County, Florida, and won’t restart production in Denmark.
He added that there is very little demolition left to do on the site, which comes with permits and a long-term lease.
“[A buyer] will be able to start building something new in September if they are ready,” he concluded.
