May 11, 2021 — The Biden administration on Tuesday approved the first large-scale offshore wind farm in the United States, a project that envisions building 62 turbines off Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts and creating enough electricity to power 400,000 homes.
NOAA Fisheries Announces Additional For-Hire Electronic Reporting Webinars
May 11, 2021 — The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:
Key Message:
NOAA Fisheries’ Southeast Regional Office will host monthly question and answer webinar sessions to assist participants with program information and compliance.
When:
The webinars are scheduled for the following dates and times:
- Tuesday, May 18, 2021, from 6:30-8:00 PM, ET
- Tuesday, June 15, 2021, from 6:30-8:00 PM, ET
- Tuesday, July 20, 2021, from 6:30-8:00 PM, ET
To register for the webinars and access additional information, such as tool-kits and instructional videos, go to: https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/southeast/recreational-fishing-data/southeast-hire-electronic-reporting-program.
Additional Information:
Program staff and vendor representatives will participate in these webinars to answer questions and resolve issues identified by users. These webinars are for anyone with an interest in the Southeast Electronic For-Hire Program and specifically, any captain, owner, or lessee running a headboat or charter trip on a vessel with any of the following federal for-hire permits: Atlantic coastal migratory pelagics, Atlantic dolphin wahoo, South Atlantic snapper-grouper, Gulf of Mexico reef fish, or Gulf of Mexico coastal migratory pelagics.
NOAA Fisheries implemented the new Southeast For-Hire Electronic Reporting Program in January 2021. This program provides more timely catch, effort, and discard information from federally-permitted for-hire vessels. Our goals in these webinars are to provide fishermen with quality customer service, improve understanding of federal for-hire data collection, and explain ways the apps may simplify the reporting requirements. NOAA Fisheries respects your time and business operations, so please continue to submit suggestions on ways we can improve your understanding of the Southeast For-Hire Electronic Reporting Program. We look forward to working with you.
Please call our customer service hotline with any questions (available from 8:00 AM-4:30 PM, ET) at 1-833-707-1632 or email us at ser.electronicreporting@noaa.gov.
Biden Administration Approves First Major Offshore Wind Energy Project
May 11, 2021 — The U.S. Interior Department Tuesday approved the country’s first large-scale offshore wind project, a final hurdle that reverses course from the Trump administration and sets the stage for a major shift in the energy landscape.
This “is a significant milestone in our efforts to build a clean and more equitable energy future while addressing the climate emergency,” Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland said during a press briefing. She said an expansion of wind energy is critical to President Biden’s ambitious climate goals to make the electricity sector carbon-neutral.
The $2.8 billion project, known as Vineyard Wind 1, will consist of 62 turbines spaced about a mile apart, each standing about 837 feet above the water’s surface. Cables buried beneath the ocean floor will connect the power from these turbines with the New England grid onshore.
The project is expected to produce enough renewable electricity to power 400,000 Massachusetts homes every year, while also saving ratepayers billions of dollars and reducing annual CO2 emissions in the state by about 1.68 million metric tons.
Lars Pedersen, Vineyard Wind’s CEO, recently told public radio station WBUR that he expects offshore construction to begin next year, with renewable energy flowing to the grid by the end of 2023.
WTO DG fixes July ministerial meeting on over-fishing rules
May 11, 2021 — The head of the World Trade Organization plans to host a ministerial meeting on July 15 where she hopes an agreement can be reached on cutting fisheries subsidies after 20 years of talks, a document showed on Monday.
Governments including major subsidisers China, the European Union and Japan spend billions of dollars a year to prop up their fishing fleets, contributing to over-fishing that is decimating wild stocks. The WTO was tasked by world leaders in 2015 with striking a deal to roll them back but missed a key deadline last year. read more
Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who took charge of the global trade watchdog in March, has made fisheries a top priority and urged ministers in an invitation letter seen by Reuters “to find the common resolve and spirit of compromise that the WTO needs to bring these twenty-year-plus negotiations to a successful conclusion at this meeting”.
Intensive negotiations will continue in Geneva with the chair of the talks, Santiago Wills, expected to issue a fourth version of the draft agreement this week.
Mollusks in Oregon coast watersheds contain forestry pesticides, study says
May 11, 2021 — Oysters, estuarine clams and freshwater mussels in watersheds along the Oregon coast contain pesticides used in managing forests, according to a study funded by Oregon Sea Grant.
Researchers from Portland State University found pesticides in 38 percent of the tissue samples. Indaziflam, an herbicide currently used in Oregon forestry, was found in about 7 percent of the samples. Contaminants also included pesticides used in orchards, Christmas tree farms and homes, as well as banned pesticides, including DDT byproducts.
The study, published in the journal Toxics, may help guide forest management practices to reduce the amounts of forestry chemicals entering aquatic ecosystems.
The study was led by Kaegan Scully-Engelmeyer, a doctoral student in the earth, environment and society program at PSU, and PSU marine ecologist Elise Granek.
They collected tissue samples from freshwater western pearlshell mussels — softshell clams typically found in the upper area of estuaries — and Pacific oysters. They collected them from watersheds along the Oregon coast in 2017 and 2018. These organisms are good indicators of environmental contamination because they are sedentary filter feeders.
WASHINGTON: Five Fast Facts about Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial
May 11, 2021 — The following was released by The Port of Seattle:
Standing tall near the water’s edge at Fishermen’s Terminal is Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial, a tribute to more than 675 local commercial fishers who lost their lives at sea. This monument serves as a place of reverence, reflection, and healing for their families and the tight-knit commercial fishing industry. Further, the organization behind the monument, also called Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial, provides valuable services to support fishers and their families. Here are five fast facts about Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial, the sculpture, and the organization:
1. The sculpture depicts fishers as larger-than-life heroes.
The bronze figure topping the monument is heroic and larger than life by design. Its size reflects the immensely important, challenging, and often dangerous work undertaken by fishers – the work of heroes. The figure is posed landing a massive, mythical fish imagined by the artist as a composite of many species: cod, salmon, herring, rockfish and others — a hero’s bounty.
2. The memorial design was chosen from 92 submissions.
In 1986 the Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial planning committee opened a contest to design and build the monument. Sculptor Ron Petty’s design was chosen among 92 submissions. It took Petty two years and four months to complete the work. The monument was dedicated October 8, 1988.
Today, Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial stands between Docks 8 and 9 at Fishermen’s Terminal. The monument features a 30-foot bronze and granite column flanked by two granite walls. These walls bear the names of local fishers lost at sea since the start of the 20th century.
Years After the Pacific Marine Heat Wave, Ecosystem Shifts Persist
May 10, 2021 — From 2014 to 2016, the Gulf of Alaska experienced the worst marine heat wave of the decade. From single-celled organisms to top predators, practically no level of the ecosystem was left unscathed. During the Pacific marine heat wave, tens of thousands of dead seabirds washed up on beaches, unusually low numbers of humpback whales arrived in their summer habitats, and toxic algal blooms spread along the West Coast of North America.
Now, a new study in Scientific Reports casts doubt on whether Gulf ecosystems will be able to return to their pre–heat wave conditions. This study—a collaborative effort between researchers at NOAA and several other government and research organizations—combined dozens of data sets to build a detailed picture of how many heat wave–induced changes have persisted. Thanks in part to long-term monitoring efforts by Gulf Watch Alaska, a program established in 2012 to assess the ongoing effects from the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, scientists were able to compare pre–heat wave and present conditions in several different sections of the ecosystem.
“We were able to show these impacts—from the intertidal out to the pelagic [open ocean] ecosystem, and from algae and phytoplankton on up to whales and commercial fisheries, and a lot of different species in between,” said Robert Suryan, a NOAA marine biologist and lead author of the study.
ALASKA: Tongass and Bristol Bay protection can help Biden meet new climate goal, fishing and conservation advocates say
May 10, 2021 — The Biden administration issued a conservation plan Thursday called “America the Beautiful.”
At 22 pages, it’s more of a statement of principles. The centerpiece is a goal of conserving 30% of the nation’s lands and waters by 2030, in part to combat climate change.
Republicans in Congress immediately criticized it as vague and an attempt to lock up natural resources.
Meanwhile, conservation groups are eyeing parts of Alaska they’d like to see protected. Their eyes are on salmon.
“It’s hard to think of two better candidates than the Tongass in Southeast Alaska and Bristol Bay in Southwest Alaska,” said Tim Bristol, executive director of Salmon State.
He said conservation measures in the Tongass and Bristol Bay would protect fish, wildlife and save thousands of jobs which depend on renewable resources.
Scientists Record 4 Collapses in Sardine Population in the Gulf of California
May 10, 2021 — In the last 30 years, overfishing and alterations caused by Climate Change decimated the number of individuals and their fishing fell from 300 thousand tons per year to only 10 thousand
Sardine capture in the Gulf of California has fallen from 300,000 tons per year to just 10,000 tons per year, in four different cycles since 1991. An international scientific study published last Tuesday in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences concluded that radical population declines in sardines, called collapses, are caused by the combination of overfishing and alterations caused by climate change.
For Vineyard Wind 1, one last hurdle
May 10, 2021 — The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is close to issuing a record of decision for Vineyard Wind 1. This is the last major step before work on the 62-turbine offshore wind farm project commences. In a statement to The Times, BOEM wrote that a review through the lens of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) is the only thing left before the record of decision can be issued.
“Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 (NHPA) requires federal agencies to consider the effects on historic properties of projects they carry out, assist, fund, permit, license, or approve throughout the country,” the agency stated. “If a federal or federally assisted project has the potential to affect historic properties, a Section 106 review will take place. In this case, the federal undertaking is to approve, approve with conditions, or disapprove the Construction and Operations Plan submitted by Vineyard Wind, LLC, for a wind energy development project southwest of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.”
Among the things beneath the ocean that must be considered in the Section 106 review are shipwrecks and Native American archeological sites.