Russ George shows how the mineral hermatite is absorbed into a tube of seawater in Foster City, Calif., in April, 2007.Thor Swift/The New York Times
A British Columbia company says a man involved in an ocean fertilization project made misleading statements about his credentials and is essentially holding some scientific data hostage.
The Haida Salmon Restoration Corp. alleges that U.S. businessman Russ George made false and misleading claims to persuade the company to dump iron ore into the ocean off the islands of Haida Gwaii.
The allegations are in a counter-claim to a civil lawsuit filed by George, in which he claims he was wrongly dismissed by the company.
He is seeking an injunction to prevent Haida Salmon from using equipment or data related to the experiment.
One hundred metric tonnes of iron dust was dumped into the Pacific Ocean in 2012 in the belief that it would cause a phytoplankton bloom that could help feed salmon and create profits from carbon capture.
Haida Salmon says it had negotiated a carbon offset sale to a company called Blue Carbon, but it says that deal was derailed by George's lawsuit.
Scientists around the globe condemned the unsanctioned experiment and Environment Canada investigated possible environmental violations.