University of Delaware Archives

2022 NOAA Northeast Sea Scallop Survey Results

June 28, 2022 — The NOAA Fisheries Integrated Sea Scallop and Habcam Research Survey is in the books for 2022. Scientists and crew completed their work aboard the University of Delaware’s R/V Hugh R. Sharp on June 13, 2022.

The Atlantic sea scallop population is surveyed every summer by NOAA Fisheries and partnering research groups. This year those partners are the Coonamessett Farm Foundation, the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth School of Marine Science and Technology. Each partner surveys an assigned area using similar methods and a standardized survey design. Here, we are reporting results for the survey areas allocated to the NOAA Fisheries-based effort, led by the Northeast Fisheries Science Center.

Resulting data are used for fishery stock assessments, fishery management, and biological studies. Sea scallops are one of the most valuable commercial fishery species in the nation.

Leg 1 of the survey was conducted May 14 to 23 off the Mid-Atlantic and southern Georges Bank. Researchers deployed the stereo camera and sensor system known as Habcam V4.

Leg 2 was conducted from May 25 to June 3, and Leg 3 operated from June 5 to June 13. On these legs, we deployed both Habcam V4 and a scallop dredge. The dredge is a standardized 8-foot wide New Bedford sea scallop dredge that collects sea scallops for biological analyses.

Read the full story at NOAA Fisheries

Scallop RSA Surveys Gather Essential Data During COVID-19

October 13, 2020 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

The industry-funded Sea Scallop Research Set-Aside (RSA) Program earned its weight in gold this year by providing the sole source of 2020 scallop survey data during the coronavirus pandemic.

NOAA Fisheries typically conducts an annual survey for Atlantic sea scallops on the R/V Hugh R. Sharp, a research vessel owned and operated by the University of Delaware. This year, however, the federal survey was canceled due to COVID-19 precautions. The cancellation of this important federal survey meant that essential information related to the current status of the resource would be missing for 2020.

Read the full release here

NOAA taps David Legates, professor who questions the seriousness and severity of global warming, for top role

September 14, 2020 — The Trump administration has tapped David Legates, an academic who has long questioned the scientific consensus that human activity is causing global warming, to help run the agency that produces much of the climate research funded by the U.S. government.

Legates, a University of Delaware professor who was forced out of his role as that state’s climatologist because of his controversial views, has taken a senior leadership role at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The agency, which oversees weather forecasting, climate research and fisheries, has until now continued its climate research and communications activities unfettered by political influence. For that, NOAA stands in stark contrast to the Environmental Protection Agency and science agencies at the Interior Department, where the Trump administration has dismissed and sidelined climate scientists or altered their work before publication.

The move to install Legates as the new deputy assistant secretary of Commerce for environmental observation and prediction, a position that would report directly to acting NOAA Administrator Neil Jacobs, is raising concerns in the science community that this could be a White House-orchestrated move to influence the agency’s scientific reports.

Read the full story at The Washington Post

A Delaware port could capture growing wind farm industry

September 11, 2020 — With several states committed to more than 8,000 megawatts of offshore wind energy in the next 15 years, Delaware could have a strong wind at its back for a burgeoning industry if an investor builds a port just north of Delaware City.

An 831-acre site near the Delaware City Refinery was recently endorsed by a University of Delaware study as a prime location to ship, store and assemble parts needed for wind farms as far north as Connecticut and as far south as the Carolinas. Turbines are growing larger – many are already taller than the Statue of Liberty – so there is greater need for large tracts of land within a 365-mile radius.

Right now there is only one East Coast marshalling port for wind turbine shipment in New Bedford, Mass., but three more are planned. Even with those online, it might not be enough for the projected market demand. Four ports could deploy 916 megawatts annually, but the UD report projects an annual deployment of up to 2 gigawatts under current contracts and state energy benchmarks – or more than twice the capacity of the operating and planned ports.

Read the full story at the Delaware Business Times

With little business, Delaware fishermen just hoping they can survive

April 17, 2020 — Brian Hoffecker almost didn’t make it through the first year he ventured off on his own as a commercial fisherman.

It was the mid-1990s and he owed a lot of money on the boat he had just bought when a historic winter storm hit his prey – Delmarva’s iconic blue crabs – hard.

“When it was time to go crabbing, I was broke,” he said. “It was brutally cold and it killed most of the crabs. There weren’t any crabs to catch.”

After more than two decades making a living on the water, the impacts of the coronavirus, Hoffecker’s livelihood is threatened once again.

Read the full story at the Delaware News Journal

Researchers examine nations losing fish species due to climate change

February 25, 2020 — As ocean warming causes fish stocks to migrate toward cooler waters to maintain their preferred thermal environment, many of the nations that rely on commercial fish species as an integral part of their economy could suffer.

A new study published in Nature Sustainability from the University of Delaware, the University of California, Santa Barbara and Hokkaido University, shows that nations in the tropics—especially Northwest African nations—are especially vulnerable to this potential species loss due to climate change. Not only are tropical countries at risk for the loss of fish stocks, the study found there are not currently any adequate policy interventions to help mitigate affected countries’ potential losses.

Kimberly Oremus, assistant professor in the School of Marine Science and Policy in UD’s College of Earth, Ocean and Environment, explained that when the researchers looked at international agreements, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, they found no specific text for what happens when fish leave a country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), a zone established to give a country national jurisdiction over a fishery resource.

That means countries could be vulnerable to economic losses, and those potential losses could make the fish populations themselves vulnerable as well.

“We realized there was an incentive for countries when they lose a fish or anticipate that loss to go ahead and overfish before it leaves because otherwise, they don’t get the monetary benefits of the resource,” said Oremus.

Read the full story at PHYS.org

Study shows impact of climate change on fishing economy

December 26, 2019 — With the Gulf of Maine warming faster than 99% of the world’s oceans, it makes sense there would be impacts on fish stocks and the fishermen who depend on them for a living.

While several studies have demonstrated that marine inhabitants are on the move trying to find cooler water, the data on how climate change is affecting fishermen has been hard to come by. Other factors — cuts to fish quotas, the closing of more areas to fishing, and gear changes to rebuild fish stocks or protect endangered species such as the right whale — also could affect the fishing industry and disguise the impact of ocean warming.

But a new study by Kimberly Oremus, a researcher at the University of Delaware, used existing data to show that fishing jobs in New England’s coastal counties declined by an average of 16% between 1996 and 2017 due to climate variation.

Oremus focused her research on what is known as North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the relative pressure differential between massive oceanic high pressure and low pressure systems in winter.

When the subtropical high pressure off the Azores is stronger than usual, there is a greater pressure differential with a low over Iceland. That means stronger winter storms crossing the Atlantic to Europe, and mild, wet winters in the eastern United States.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

‘Climate shocks’ reducing fish stocks in New England, and Atlantic Canada could be next

December 11, 2019 — A new study says “climate shocks” are reducing fish populations in the North Atlantic region, leading to fewer jobs and lower wages in New England’s fishing sector.

Fishing communities along the northeastern U.S. seaboard have long struggled with warming waters, dwindling fish stocks and rising unemployment.

The research published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is the first to directly link climate change with declining fishing jobs.

It found that climate fluctuations caused a 16 per cent drop in fisheries employment in New England from 1996 to 2017.

The findings suggest Atlantic Canada’s fisheries could also potentially experience increasing variability in fish stocks, revenue and employment due to climate change in the coming years.

Read the full story at The Chronicle Herald

New England fishermen losing jobs due to climate fluctuations

December 11, 2019 — For decades the biggest threat to the industry has been overfishing, but it is no longer the only threat. According to new research at the University of Delaware, fluctuations in the climate have already cost some New England fishermen their jobs.

UD’s Kimberly Oremus, assistant professor of marine policy, makes the direct link, for the first time, between large-scale climate variability and fishing job losses in a study published Dec. 9 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

By correlating the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) — New England’s dominant climate signal — with labor numbers, Oremus determined that New England’s coastal counties have, on average, lost 16% of their fishing jobs due to climate variation from 1996 to 2017.

This specific effect of climate is distinct from the overall job losses and gains caused by other factors, such as changes in market demand, regulatory changes to curb overfishing, and broader economic trends. Currently, 34,000 commercial marine fishermen are employed in New England’s industry.

“As we see more warm winters off the New England coast, historic fisheries decline and fewer fishermen stay in business,” Oremus said. “This has important implications for fisheries management in New England, which employs 20% of U.S. commercial harvesters.”

Read the full story at Science Daily

New funding to study microplastic pollution effect on Delaware Bay blue crabs

November 6, 2019 — The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is often held up as the poster child for ocean pollution. And while the collection of trash collecting in the Pacific Ocean certainly deserves attention, researchers at the University of Delaware are concerned about a smaller source of pollution, much smaller.

Through its marine debris program, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is giving the university a $325,000 grant to study the impact of microplastics on blue crab populations near the Delaware Bay. Microplastics are defined as pieces of plastic less than five millimeters in length, or smaller than a pencil eraser. According to NOAA, some microplastics are microbeads, fibers or pellets that come from cosmetics or personal care products, for instance. They can also come from larger pieces of plastic that split apart and break down after exposure to the sun.

It’s estimated that there’s about five trillion tons of marine debris in our oceans and plastics are 90% of that, said UD College of Earth, Ocean and Environment Dean Estella Atekwana. “This grant is really timely so we can advance our understanding of what plastics do to our marine ecosystems,” she said.

Read the full story at WHYY