September 2, 2015 — WASHINGTON –The National Marine Fisheries Service erred by not considering the impact of climate change when it drafted a biological opinion on loggerhead turtles in the northwest Atlantic, a federal judge ruled.
But in his August 31 ruling, U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman said over all the agency’s biological opinion on the impact of seven east coast fisheries on turtle populations is not arbitrary, as greens had charged.
Friedman granted in part and denied in part a motion for summary judgment filed by Oceana Inc., challenging the agency’s determination that seven fisheries it studied are not jeopardizing the existence of loggerhead sea turtles, and sent the opinion back to the fisheries service for certain clarifications.
In an “incidental take” report on seven east coast fisheries, the agency calculated the numbers of sea turtles that might be caught in specific types of fishing devices, and of those how many might die.
By the agency’s calculations, approximately 483 loggerhead turtles will be caught annually, 239 of which might die.
Oceana had challenged the agency’s report, saying it uses five year study intervals in its calculations, which is too long, and doesn’t take into effect the shorter-term effects of global warming.
Friedman agreed with Oceana that the “incidental take” report doesn’t explain how the agency will monitor whether the take limits have been exceeded, and that the agency’s reasons for why it only monitors the turtles every five years aren’t clear.
While the court isn’t in a position to say that the agency’s five year monitoring cycle is “per se arbitrary and capricious,” as Oceana had claimed, Friedman found that, “there is apparent ‘tension’ between the regulatory mandate and the infrequency with which NMFS measures take estimates against the take limit … and this dissonance places an onus on the agency to adequately explain the reasonableness of the approach.”
Read the full story at Courthouse News Service