While the plan to set the seismic survey industry loose on the Mid Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) has only seemed like a three-alarm fire for just the last few years, this plan was first hatched over ten years ago…
As we are closing in on the Outer Continental Shelf leasing program comment period, it appears as if the oilmen are running into a few snags. The first, of course, was Secretary Ryan Zinke’s arbitrary (and out-of-process) exemption of Florida…
I spent all last week at an animal communications conference in Omaha and wanted to detail that in this week’s newsletter. But it was brought to my attention that our last newsletter needed some tidying up first. The newsletter topic…
The jury still seems to be out on the biological impacts of seismic airgun surveys. While there is ample evidence of migratory, feeding, communication, and other behavioral disruptions in marine mammals, and habitat and dispersal disruptions in fish – along…
I typically eschew technical excavations in our newsletter, but seismic surveys are an important tent-stake in the ocean noise discussion, so I offer the following three-minute read in hopes that you find it informative and entertaining (if not a bit…
If it wasn’t otherwise abundantly clear, the splurge of Executive Orders (EO) over the last two weeks confirm that the US President has handed the reins (or should I say “handed the reign”) of the executive branch over to the…
I’ve just returned from Washington DC educating legislators and questioning regulators over an ominous situation in the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). Since 2014 there has been a “full court press” by the oil industry and their friends in…
Back in August of 2014 the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) attempted to mitigate public outrage for a hastily made decision on opening up the US Atlantic continental shelf to seismic surveys by publishing an unsubstantiated puff piece on…
Close to two years ago we reviewed and submitted comments to a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) five-year survey plan for the offshore uses of the Atlantic Seaboard issued by the Bureau of Offshore Energy Management (BOEM). At the time…
This week Ker Than from National Geographic asked us for a critique on recommendations that came out of a study on the impacts of seismic surveys on Gray whales. The research was conducted by an “A Team” of scientists pulled…