SavingSeaFood - Feds court wind companies' 'interest' in fishing grounds

Home

Feds court wind companies' 'interest' in fishing grounds

The Obama administration has asked wind energy companies for notices of interest in leasing blocks in a 2,200-nautical-square-mile sector of rich fishing waters south of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket, a move that further threatens New England's fishing fleet.

The area of interest was determined in consultation with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, according to the U.S. Department of Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement.

The bureau is the successor to the Mineral Management Service that drew extensive fire for lax regulation of oil and gas exploration in the Gulf of Mexico after BP's Deepwater Horizon well imploded last April.

The Habitat Committee of the New England Fishery Management Council was briefed on the project for the first time last Thursday by Chris Boelke, a habitat resources specialist assigned to the Gloucester regional office of the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Read the complete story from The Gloucester Times.

STEVE SCHEIBLAUER: California's “Forage” Fish Protection Strongest in the World, Yet Extremists Still Want to Ban Fishing

Monterey Bay's historic "wetfish" industry is under attack by extremist groups who claim overfishing is occurring. Touting studies with faulty calculations, activists are lobbying federal regulators to massively limit fishing, if not ban these fisheries outright. Apparently the facts don’t matter to groups with an anti-fishing agenda

More Opinion >