January 25, 2023 — A big plan was revealed in Augusta Tuesday to bring floating wind turbines to the Gulf of Maine.
The bill to jumpstart offshore wind development was unveiled at the State House.
Supporters claim the bill is about boosting responsible offshore wind development in the Gulf of Maine, saying it will help drive down energy costs across the board.
They believe Maine could become an industry leader in offshore wind as a potential major source of clean energy.
January 20, 2023 — The potential use of wind turbines off the coast of Maine to generate electricity has drawn scientific and commercial interest for at least a decade – and now the federal government is taking a next step to determine where those turbines might go.
The U.S. Department of the Interior last August issued a formal request-of-interest to gauge the potential market for wind-energy leases within about 13.7 million acres of the Gulf of Maine. The department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has scaled this site down to a “draft call area” of 9.9 million acres, and now is looking to obtain public feedback on leasing the waters for commercial wind-power production.
The bureau will hold a meeting in Portland on Thursday to receive input from marine businesses, fishermen and other ocean users about the location and size of the area. The meeting is scheduled for 5-8 p.m. at the Holiday Inn By the Bay, 88 Spring St., and the agenda and more information can be found here.
October 17, 2022 — It seems like an insurmountable engineering feat: Tow concrete hulls weighing 12,000 tons far offshore, erect towers atop them that rise hundreds of feet above the ocean with rotor blades the span of a football field, and somehow get them to produce significant amounts of wind energy despite the violent seas and notorious weather of the North Atlantic Ocean.
All that without embedding the colossal structures into the seafloor, because unlike traditional offshore wind turbines, these will float.
And that’s exactly what Habib Dagher intends to pull off in the Gulf of Maine, with the first of these monumental structures planned for a location a few miles off the coast of Monhegan Island in 2025.
September 21, 2022 — Several New England and national environmental groups say the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management is making a mistake by moving forward to designate wind energy areas in the Gulf of Maine.
The Conservation Law Foundation and other groups asked BOEM in May to do “a comprehensive environmental review” before proceeding with outlining potential areas for wind projects. Activists are criticizing the agency, which on Aug. 19 published a “request for interest” from wind development companies.
Read the full article at the National Fisherman
September 20, 2022 — The following was released by the Conservation Law Foundation:
The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has declined to conduct a comprehensive environmental review before designating areas for offshore wind development in the Gulf of Maine. Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) and several partners had pushed for a full review to be done before wind areas are chosen.
“This decision epitomizes short-term thinking that will only cause problems in the long run,” said Erica Fuller, Senior Attorney at CLF. “It’s simply backwards to choose areas for offshore wind development before doing a full environmental analysis, which would ultimately save time and money if done now. It is critical to advance offshore wind to respond to the climate crisis and clean up our electric grid, but it must be done in a science-based, inclusive and transparent way.”
Considered to be one of the most productive ecosystems in the world, the Gulf of Maine plays a significant role in the culture of New England and is the foundation for a coastal economy characterized by commercial and recreational fishing, aquaculture, recreational boating, shipping, and tourism.
CLF was joined in this effort by 350NH, Acadia Center, Blue Ocean Society, Friends of Casco Bay, Island Institute, League of Conservation Voters, Maine Conservation Voters, Maine Audubon, Mass. Audubon, National Audubon Society, National Wildlife Federation, Natural Resources Council of Maine, NRDC, New England Aquarium, New Hampshire Audubon, Oceana, and Surfrider Foundation.
August 25, 2022 — The Maine Lobstering Union is agreeing to drop part of its lawsuit against the National Marine Fisheries Services, where the federal agency is closing a 960-square-mile section of the Gulf of Maine to lobster fishers.
Federal regulators said this section of ocean is prime habitat for North Atlantic right whales and argued blocking that part of the ocean off from buoy lines from Oct. 18 to Jan. 31, 2023, would help reduce the risk posed to entanglements between lobster gear and whales.
Alfred C Frawley with McCloskey, Mina, Cunniff, and Frawley, LLC, said in an email the move was made as federal agencies add more regulations against the lobster industry.
“The MLU has taken the procedural step of agreeing to dismiss its case in Maine, which was largely mooted by the DC Court’s recent decision, in order to focus its resources on the ongoing litigation in DC and on ensuring that NMFS issues a new rule that both protects the North Atlantic right whale and ensures the sustainability of Maine’s lobster fishery,” Frawley said in an email to NEWS CENTER Maine.
August 9, 2022 — Nearly a millennium of cooling in the Gulf of Maine has been reversed over the past century.
That’s the finding of a new study, published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment, led by Massachusetts-based Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, co-written by the University of Maine and funded by the National Science Foundation.
Scientists have long warned that the Gulf of Maine is warming faster than most of the world’s oceans — 2021 was yet another year of record warmth — but the lack of long-term records has made it difficult to compare the 20th and 21st centuries to warming or cooling trends for past periods.
The oldest records available come from a station in Boothbay Harbor, where surface water temperatures have been tracked since 1905.
August 8, 2022 — Fans of “Wicked Tuna” often ask Capt. Dave Marciano of Beverly how they might get a taste of the giant bluefin tunas he and his fellow boat captains reel out of the Gulf of Maine on the popular National Geographic reality TV show.
“People have said this to me a hundred times, ‘Where can we get some of the fish that we see you catch on the show?’ I bet I have been asked that a thousand times. and I can’t send them anywhere to get a piece of the fish,” besides a few local restaurants, he said, or maybe a sushi buyer looking for tuna with a high fat for the Asian market.
“We’ve put this name in the households,” Marciano said. “We’ve put the idea of this product in people’s heads. Right now we just can’t send it to them. Well, that’s about to change.”
Starting Sept. 1, Marciano, whose Angelica Fisheries offers fishing charters aboard the fishing vessels Hard Merchandise and Falcon from Gloucester, is casting out his reality show fame to hook customers as he starts a new business called Angelica Seafoods.
The business plans to offer premium fresh seafood products from Gloucester and New England.
July 27, 2022 — Lobstermen in Maine will have to comply with a new reporting requirement, which will be implemented in 2023, but a free app, VESL, will help fishermen meet their reporting obligations with ease.
Currently only 10 percent of state licensed lobster harvesters in Maine must report their harvest, according to the Department of Marine Resources. However, as part of an update to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission fishery management plan for lobster, 100 percent of state licensed commercial lobstermen will have to report their harvest information, including location of fishing activity and pounds landed, in 2023.
The common notion among the public is that reporting to the government is complicated and time consuming, but it doesn’t have to be so, and that’s where BlueFin Data comes in. The company developed, under a contract with the Maine Department of Marine Resources, the app, called VESL, so lobstermen can meet their reporting obligations with ease. VESL represents the solution to the required increase in the percentage of lobster harvesters who must submit reports.
VESL, which is available for iOS and Android devices and can be downloaded free Apple App Store and Google Play Store, is a hub for collecting quality data with the least amount of effort all in one place, and report it to the government.
July 21, 2022 — The health of the ocean is at stake, according to fishing industry advocates who oppose offshore wind development.
A report on the threats posed to commercial fishing was released after an offshore wind conference held in Boston in May.
The Partnership’s Vice President and Executive Director Angela Sanfilippo said her organization is concerned about the health of the ocean, the health of the fish stock, and the health of the industry. She calls plans for fast-tracking wind developments a threat to all three.