In the early years of the ocean noise discussion there were heated debates about whether or not introduced noise was really harmful to marine life. Our understanding was shallow and the tools blunt. Even when animals washed ashore deafened, dead,…
BOEM lays an egg.
It seems as if the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has been taking some heat on their “Record of Decision” on paving the way to Geophysical and Geological (G&G) surveys in the Mid and South Atlantic. It was just…
Blue Drinks – Ocean Conservation Research edition
Come on out to Fairfax for Blue Drinks – Ocean Conservation Research edition! When: Tuesday August 19, 5:30pm onward Where: Iron Springs Brewpub, 765 Center Blvd. Fairfax, CA Why?: Iron Springs sponsors a “Give Back Tuesdays” each week. 10%…
Follow-up on Flamenco Fundraiser
For those who were unable to attend our Flamenco Fundraiser last Friday, you missed some really fabulous music – as well as some top-notch socializing with supporters of OCR and the Marin AIDS Project. It was such an honor to…
Obama Administration completely fails on Atlantic Seismic Surveys
Despite the thousands of comments advising against opening up the Atlantic Seaboard to offshore oil and gas exploration, today President Obama approved opening up the Eastern Outer Continental Shelf to seismic airgun surveys. As we highlighted in our recent critique…
Perfunctory documents still haunting offshore regulations?
The initial post-disaster review of the contingency plans for the BP-Macondo operations revealed that the plans were a pile of boilerplate used as a proxy for the required papers. This was made clear to the public when the documents included…
Expressing the measure of things
Over the last week I was participating in an International Standards Organization (ISO) meeting hosted by the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) with an august assemblage of underwater noise stakeholders working on underwater acoustics standards. While this activity…
Big noises going on out yonder
Dynamically stabilized oil drilling and production platform. With much of the offshore noise attention being focused on seismic airgun surveys, other aspects of the fossil fuel industry’s contribution to ocean noise pollution may be sneaking by our review –…
Save the Whales! Really!
When OCR Program Director Kathi Koontz came on board with our team earlier this year she had one request: that we give her some flexibility to participate in saving whales. While this is part of OCR’s mission, Kathi was referring…