Tuesday, May 19, 2026: Today the Center for Food Safety (CFS) and the Coalition to Protect Puget Sound Habitat were in federal court in Tacoma, Washington to protect Washington state's coast from industrial shellfish aquaculture. CFS attorneys and their co-counsel presented their arguments opposed by both the defendant the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the shellfish intervenors. The Plaintiffs were represented by counsel from CFS and the law offices of Karl Anuta. 

The shellfish aquaculture facilities are massive operations spanning hundreds of acres of Washington's most sensitive coastal habitat. These plastic-intensive operations have significant adverse effects on the surrounding environment, including threatened and endangered species that depend on these waters for habitat. 

Despite a court order in a prior litigation requiring the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ending in 2020 to fully analyze the environmental effects of industrial shellfish operations, regulators have instead relied on a streamlined permit review procedures known as LOPs to authorize these same operations without any environmental review or public notice. 

"Industrial aquaculture must be accountable to science, law, and the communities whose lives and cultures are tied to these waters. We're calling on the court to do what the Corps failed to: protect our iconic marine ecosystems from being overwhelmed by plastic, pesticides, and profit-driven development," said Kristina Sinclair, staff attorney at Center for Food Safety, lead counsel on the case. 

Shellfish aquaculture in Washington state already occupies a massive footprint:  

• Between 38,700 and50,000 acresof tidelands—nearly aquarter of all tidelands in the state—are used for commercial operations,including inPuget Sound, Willapa Bay, Hood Canal, and Grays Harbor. 

• These facilities use 43,000 PVC tubes per acre to grow geoducks, as well as netting, heavy machinery, crushed shell, and herbicides to prepare and harvest the seabed.

• Washington's industrial shellfish sector generates more than $150 million in annual revenue, but at great cost to salmon habitat, water quality, migratory birds, and endangered marine species.

This legal fight is part of CFS's broader campaign to ensure that the expansion of industrial aquaculture doesn't come at the cost of ecological integrity, tribal sovereignty, or the public's right to clean and accessible shorelines.