Conservation & Environment

This report examine the risks, challenges and potential consequences of oil spills associated with oil and gas exploration and production in the outer continental shelf (OCS) of the United States Arctic Ocean. The April 2010 Deepwater Horizon well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico prompted a reconsideration of the potential for a major blowout from proposed oil exploration or production in the Arctic OCS. This report was developed to contribute to the policy discussion regarding the risks and consequences of such spills.

View the full report (PDF)

View the policy recommendations (PDF)

Read more about the report from PEW.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Don't let the summer's disastrous BP oil spill get too far from your thoughts. There is still much to do. Gov. Bob Riley is complaining about how the feds are spending some of the money. And the government itself is saying the work to clean and restore the Gulf of Mexico will take years — perhaps decades.

Jane Lubchenco, the U.S. undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and the administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, writes in Sunday's Viewpoints section that even now, scientists are trying to "determine the true extent of the environmental damage." Lubchenco writes: "The goal is to hold BP and other responsible parties accountable for the restoration and compensation for the damage done by the spill to the Gulf's natural environment."

This is separate from holding BP and others responsible for the economic damage, too. Also Sunday, Bloomberg News columnist Ann Woolner discusses possible criminal charges surrounding Halliburton's use of flawed cement at the BP Deepwater Horizon well. Halliburtan "may be wishing it had more carefully observed certain boundaries as new evidence emerges of its role in the biggest oil spill in U.S. history," Woolner writes.

Read the complete story from Alabama Live.

 

 

 

 

 

The change in Maine will be staggering – not once since the first comprehensive environmental statutes were passed in the 1970’s has there been a Republican governor and a Republican controlled Legislature.

Governor-elect Paul LePage’s rhetoric on the campaign trail was alarmingly anti-environmental.  Beyond staking his election on dismantling Maine’s agencies tasked with safeguarding our environment, he has bluntly expressed support for offshore oil drilling in the wake of the worst oil spill ever experienced by our country.  He supports building wildly expensive new nuclear power plants.  Rather mind-numbing is the fact that he considers climate change to be at the least, subject to scientific debate if not outright denying it.  And he opposes sustainable  wind development.  Even more problematic is a pervasive sense that he simply doesn’t “get it” – doesn’t get the concept of sustainability, doesn’t get the economic value of a strong and vibrant environment and doesn’t get Mainers abiding conviction that ours is a unique state that merits strong efforts to maintain.

The Conservation Law Foundation has always believed that a thriving Maine is the result of strong environmental protections and sound economic principles.  That belief – and CLF’s unique ability to translate it into practical, effective and results-oriented advocacy – will be more important than ever as a new administration attempts to dismantle the environmental protections of the last four decades.  

Read the complete story from The Conservation Law Foundation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VENICE, La. – For birds, fish, sea turtles, marine mammals and ocean-based economies on the Gulf coast, the immediate catastrophe from the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill has ebbed, but the long-term effects have yet to unfold.

Everything, from shrimp fleets in Louisiana to chicken wings in Buffalo, hinges on the health of tiny plants and animals at risk from oil lingering in the environment. Undetectable by sight or smell, trace amounts of degraded oil are poisoning these species, called plankton, at the bottom of the food chain, scientists say.

The extent of the damage and its implications for the health of the Gulf are unknown and likely will not surface for another year or two.

Read the complete story from the Herald Tribune.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) today released a responsible policy to “encourage well-designed catch share programs to help maintain or rebuild fisheries, and sustain fishermen, communities and vibrant working waterfronts, including the cultural and resource access traditions that have been part of this country since its founding.” EDF applauds this policy because it will restore fisheries and improve fishermen’s lives and livelihoods.

For too long the government has propped up a failed system of ocean fishery management. Conventional management has resulted in shrinking fishing seasons, fishery closures, and increased waste.  Fishermen are faced with burdensome and ineffective regulations. Because of this today’s fishing jobs are dangerous, part-time, and relatively unstable, and more than 60 federal fish stocks are classified as overfished or undergoing overfishing. Rebuilt fisheries could increase the dockside value of commercially-caught fish by $2.2B (54% above current value) in the US.

Catch shares management is the right approach because it improves the conservation of the fishery, drives economic growth, and empowers fishermen to have stable, profitable businesses. Unlike conventional management, which manages the details of how fishermen conduct their business, catch shares provide fishermen with flexibility — allowing them to be more targeted and efficient. This means overfishing ends, wasteful bycatch declines, and revenues increase.  Jobs under well-designed catch shares tend to be full-time, higher-paying, safer and more secure over the short and long terms.

Read the complete blog from EDF.

 

 

 

 

 

 

NOAA’s Office of Education announced today that it has awarded grants totaling more than $8 million to seventeen institutions across the country to engage the public in science education activities that improve understanding and stewardship of the local and global environment.  Included are projects that enhance or expand museum exhibits using data visualization, expand citizen science networks, develop family programs for underserved/underrepresented audiences and enhance teen education programs.

“NOAA is pleased to be working with such a dedicated and diverse group of science education institutions,” said Dr. Jane Lubchenco, under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “Our new investments strongly support NOAA’s efforts to encourage public stewardship activities and informed decision making. We are excited about the opportunity to work more closely with lifelong learners.”

NOAA's Environmental Literacy Grants program is a competitive national grant program focused on creating an environmentally literate public that uses a comprehensive understanding of the role of the ocean, coasts, Great Lakes, weather and climate in the global ecosystem to make the best social and economic decisions. The program provides funding for an array of educational organizations that reach diverse audiences.

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in the Earth's environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and to conserve and manage our coastal and marine resources.

List of all grants and recipients:

These seventeen grants will fund thirteen projects:

University of Wisconsin & University of Maryland; “A collaborative project: Interpretation of Real-Time Weather and Climate Data for Spherical Displays”; $1,159,887

American Museum of Natural History (N.Y.); “Exploring Earth Systems: Expanding Data Visualization Experiences for Museum Learners”; $826,112

Denver Museum of Nature & Science, California Academy of Sciences, University of Louisville; “A collaborative project: The Worldview Network: Ecological Literacy Programming for Digital Planetariums and Beyond”; $1,248,123

Colorado State University; “CoCoRaHS: Capitalizing on Technological Advancements to Expand Environmental Literacy through a successful Citizen Science Network”; $1,249,993

Nurture Nature Center, Inc. (Pa.); “Science on a Sphere and Flood Forums: Education to Action”; $341,274

College of Exploration (Va.), Literacy Volunteers of America (Fla.); “A collaborative project: Engaging ESL adult and youth learners in technologically facilitated outdoor experiential learning to improve environmental, ocean, climate and English literacy”; $400,000

Seacoast Science Center (N.H.); “Families by the Seaside: Building community-based outdoor ocean science learning experiences”; $489,574

Science Museum of Virginia; “Science on a Sphere–Earth Systems Display Center at Science Museum of Virginia”; $295,202

Science Museum of Minnesota; “Planet Earth Decision Theater”; $500,001

Miami Science Center; “Hurricanes and Climate Change: Local Impacts and Global Systems”; $499,559

Monterey Bay Aquarium; “Teen Conservation Leadership”; $450,000

Butler University (Ind.); “FLOW: an innovative educational toolkit for river awareness”; $257,492

Exploratorium (Calif.); “Embedding NOAA in a Public Learning Laboratory – The Environmental Scientist-In-Residence Program at the Exploratorium”; $517,900

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in the Earth's environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and to conserve and manage our coastal and marine resources.

Read this announcement from NOAA News.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They call it the "Jaws" effect. Inspired by the 1975 movie about a great white shark that terrorized a tourist town, legions of fishermen piled into boats and killed thousands of the ocean predators in shark fishing tournaments.

Although most of the tournaments have shut down or gone to catch-and-release, a commercial shark fishing industry arose in their place to serve the Chinese demand for shark-fin soup, a luxury dish comparable to caviar.

Today, about that 345 of 1,044 species of the world's sharks, skates and rays are threatened with extinction, according to an article published in the most recent issue of the journal Science. It also raises the possibility that in a few generations the oceans will lose layers of predators that keep marine ecosystems in balance.

Read the complete story from the Kansas City Star.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oceana Outraged: U.S. Government Increases Authorized Capture of Threatened Loggerhead Sea Turtles by 14 Times in Eight Mid-Atlantic and New England Fisheries

November 1, 2010
Washington, D.C.
Contact: Dustin Cranor ( dcranor@oceana.org )

The U.S. government announced late-Friday it is increasing the number of threatened loggerhead sea turtles that can be legally caught annually in eight Mid-Atlantic and New England fisheries by more than 14 times, from 42 to 610 sea turtles. The western north Atlantic loggerhead population has declined significantly over the last decade and the government recently proposed stronger protections for this population by changing its status from threatened to endangered under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.

Oceana’s senior campaign director Dave Allison responded with the following statement:

“Oceana is outraged by the government’s decision to increase the authorized catch of threatened loggerhead sea turtles in the Atlantic by more than 14 times. The number of loggerhead sea turtles that can be legally caught by these eight Mid-Atlantic and New England fisheries jumped from 42 to 610. The government once again reviewed each of these fisheries in a vacuum, ignoring the impacts of other fisheries and activities that interact with sea turtles. The U.S. government needs to look at the cumulative impacts of all fisheries on sea turtle populations to adequately assess whether commercial fishing has a negative impact on these at risk species.

Bottom trawls and gillnets are to blame for the vast majority of sea turtle bycatch in these eight fisheries. The government is simply turning a blind eye to sea turtle bycatch by rubber stamping these new authorized catch levels rather than requiring the industry to reduce its impact on threatened and endangered sea turtles. Of the eight fisheries, the ones with the highest levels of loggerhead sea turtle bycatch are the summer flounder, scup and black seabass fishery, and the monkfish fishery.

Other protected sea turtles, leatherback, Kemp’s ridley and green sea turtles are also allowed to be caught in these eight fisheries. The National Marine Fisheries Service’s method for setting authorized take levels for these species is flawed. Because the Fisheries Service claims it does not have enough data to estimate how many sea turtles are actually being caught, it sets the authorized levels based on the number of sea turtles observed to be caught. However, only a tiny fraction of these fisheries have fisheries observers onboard, therefore observed sea turtle takes are likely to be well below the number that are actually caught. 

The Fisheries Service released a report documenting the impact of Mid-Atlantic and New England trawls on loggerhead sea turtles in September 2006.  More than four years later, the Fisheries Service is just now updating its authorization levels for these fisheries, but continues to fail to take action to solve the problem. In fact, most trawl fisheries are still allowed to operate without a simple solution that is successfully utilized in other U.S. trawl fisheries – turtle excluder devices (TEDs), which allow sea turtles to escape after being unintentionally captured.”

See this press release from Oceana.

 

 

 

 

Alewife is best known as the end of the Red Line, the last stop for thousands of commuters. Some know the name derives from a breed of river herring that fed the region’s early settlers. But few, if any, realize that the beloved alewife may be going the way of the passenger pigeon.

Numbers of river herring have dwindled so quickly that the three southern New England states banned fishing of it in their waters. But the fish have not rebounded to levels of even a decade ago. Conservation groups think they know why: Trawlers for sea herring are dragging the smaller river herring, which spawn in sea water, into their nets.

The best course would be strict caps on bycatch of river herring, enforced by monitors. About a third of the region’s 25 or so herring trawlers go out with such monitors now. In Alaska, all large trawlers have monitors on board.

Read the complete editorial from The Boston Globe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As Brewster naturalist John Hay famously chronicled in his 1959 book, "The Run," the spawning cycle of the Atlantic river herring — also known as the alewife — is one plagued with many hurdles.

The National Marine Fisheries Service currently lists river herring as a "species of concern" under the Endangered Species Act. In their migration to their freshwater spawning areas, the silvery fish face many obstacles — blocking of spawning habitat by dams, clogged runs, shoreside development, predatory animals, and pollution in ponds and streams.

But clearly the greatest threat to what has been termed one of America's "founding fishes" is the increasing human efficiency in catching them. Since 2000, the once epic numbers of river herring have dropped precipitously, from over 50 million pounds a year to less than a million pounds in 2009 — a decline of over 95 percent. Unless action is taken, we run the risk of losing river herring populations forever.

Read the complete editorial from All Business.