Saving Seafood

Rep. Kennedy confirms he’s considering Senate bid against Markey

August 26, 2019 — Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy confirmed Monday he’s considering running for Senate next year, setting up a potential blockbuster Democratic primary against Sen. Ed Markey.

“Over the past few weeks I’ve begun to consider a run for the U.S. Senate,” Kennedy wrote in a post on Facebook. “This isn’t a decision I’m approaching lightly and — to be completely candid — I wasn’t expecting to share my thoughts so soon.”

Kennedy said he had not reached a decision and would spend the next “couple weeks” discussing the potential campaign with supporters. His post did not mention Markey or the potential primary. Markey has been in the Senate since a 2013 special election and won his first full term a year later. He already faces competition from two other Democrats for the September 2020 primary.

Read the full story at Politico

VINEYARD WIND: Notice to Mariners and Fishermen No. 16

August 23, 2019 — The following was released by Vineyard Wind:

We wanted to let you know that the School for Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) and the Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association (MLA) are coordinating a lobster ventless trap survey in the northern section of the Vineyard Wind lease area as well as a control area to the east.

The survey is ongoing through October 2019.

View the full notice here.

Trawls are set in East/West direction and are configured in 8 pot strings approximately 1,200 feet long marked with double highflyers and double large Go Deep buoys labeled MLA/SMAST, DA19-017.

We encourage fishermen who may be working in the survey area to contact the captains directly or contact the following:

Beth Casoni – MA Lobstermen’s Association, Phone: 508-738-1245

Crista Bank – FL Vineyard Wind, Phone: 508-525-0421

Vineyard Wind is committed to communicating and working with the local fishermen in the region during all stages of development of the proposed offshore wind farm.

Read the full release here

Fishermen question settlement of convicted Carlos Rafael

August 23, 2019 — The penalties keep coming for New Bedford fishing mogul Carlos Rafael, the self-styled “Codfather” who once dominated groundfishing in the Northeast with one of the largest independently owned fleets in the country.

He is halfway through a 46-month federal prison sentence for violations that included falsely labeling fish, smuggling cash, tax evasion and falsifying federal records. He also was fined more than $300,000 and ordered to sell off two vessels and permits in that criminal case.

This week, Rafael was hit with more than $3 million in fines and a lifetime ban as part of a settlement agreement in a civil case brought against him by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Ørsted hires Coast Guard waterways chief

August 23, 2019 — The former Coast Guard waterways management chief for New England has joined offshore wind energy company Ørsted, as the emerging U.S. industry comes to grips with pushback from commercial fishermen and other interests.

Ed LeBlanc, a former Coast Guard officer and most recently chief of the Waterways Management Division for Coast Guard Sector Southeastern New England, will be manager of marine affairs for Ørsted U.S. Offshore Wind, the Denmark-based energy company’s American division.

In his last position of 16 years with the Coast Guard First District, LeBlanc was in the forefront of planning to how the newly arriving offshore wind industry could coexist with commercial fishing and maritime transportation traffic in the Northeast. An element of that will be safe vessel transit lanes through planned wind turbine arrays off Martha’s Vineyard, Mass.

Read the full story at WorkBoat

Troubling questions, concerns raised about off-shore wind farms

August 22, 2019 — Oceanographer Jon Hare listed the effects of offshore wind development on the marine environment.

There’s disturbance to the sea floor during installation of turbine platforms. Noise from pile-driving and other activities. Increases in boat traffic. Lighting of the project site. Dredging for electric cables.

The impacts can be far-reaching.

“Putting a pile into the sediment in essence is habitat alteration,” said Hare, a science and research director with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center. “You’re taking relatively smooth, unconsolidated sediments and converting it to hard structure, converting that habitat into something else.”

Although Hare didn’t name Vineyard Wind during a seminar on Wednesday, or talk about the company’s 84-turbine wind farm proposed in waters south of Martha’s Vineyard, in Massachusetts, the potential impacts he detailed speak to some of the reasons why NOAA has raised concerns about the project, which has led to further scrutiny of the application by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

Read the full story at the Providence Journal

Wind turbines and radar mix poorly

August 22, 2019 — As budding offshore wind development brings the U.S. to the brink of a new chapter in energy production, questions remain as to how radar interference caused by wind turbines will be diminished or eliminated.

Vineyard Wind’s 84-turbine wind farm, slated for an Atlantic lease area about 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, effectively had the rug pulled out from underneath it August 9, when the Department of the Interior announced the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) would hold off signing a Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) and re-examine potential impacts posed by the project. Radar was not specifically cited as something the feds would take a second look at. However, weather and aeronautical radar are all well-documented as being adversely affected by wind turbines, and a handful of studies show marine radar is also hampered by wind turbines. Fishermen who spoke with The Times said they already work in an inherently dangerous industry, and offshore radar interference has the potential to exacerbate that danger.

Technological measures to lessen radar interference from turbines are being researched and slowly implemented in the U.S. and Europe. However, none appear to be folded into the construction plans for Vineyard Wind. In its Revised Navigation Risk Assessment, Vineyard Wind borrowed from a 2009 U.S. Coast Guard review for the never-realized Cape Wind project, and stated for its own project, “impacts to radar should not negatively impact a mariner’s ability to safely navigate in the [wind development area]; even so, Vineyard Wind will work with stakeholders to identify potential mitigation measures, as necessary.”

Read the full story at the MV Times

Lobstermen seek help in protecting right whales

August 22, 2019 — Commercial lobstermen urged federal regulators Wednesday to take Canada to task for its failure to protect North Atlantic right whales and to remember that local lobstermen carry a heavier burden of regulation than others in U.S. waters.

“We as lobstermen do not want to see harm come to the right whale,” Plymouth lobsterman Tom O’Reilly said at a public forum at Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical School, the eighth in a series of meetings held this month on revisions to the plan to reduce the risk to whales posed by fishing gear. “We have done so much as an industry to try to prevent this.”

The Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association believes Canada can do more, as can other coastal areas in the Northeast. “We’re still at the table today,” said Beth Casoni, the association’s executive director, despite what the fishermen see as a heavier regulatory burden.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

MAYOR MITCHELL DISCUSSES NOAA LEGAL SETTLEMENT WITH CARLOS RAFAEL

August 22, 2019 — Mayor Jon Mitchell is expanding on his comments on the settlement reached this week between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the imprisoned “Codfather” Carlos Rafael.

As part of the settlement, Rafael will have to give up all commercial fishing by December 31, 2019, and all scalloping by March 31, 2020. In addition, Rafael is ordered to a $3,010,633 civil monetary penalty and relinquish the seafood dealer permit issued to Carlos Seafood by September 1.

According to NOAA, Rafael I is required to sell his fishing vessels and permits and will be allowed to keep the proceeds. Free to sell his licenses to whomever he pleases, Rafael has indicated that he intends to keep all of them in New Bedford.

Read the full story at WBSM

MASSACHUSETTS: Vineyard Wind project gains bipartisan support from federal lawmakers

August 22, 2019 — A bipartisan call for federal officials to move quickly on permits for the Vineyard Wind offshore wind project came Monday from the state’s congressional leaders along with colleagues from Louisiana.

“We believe it is possible for multiple industries to coexist in mixed use regions offshore,” the lawmakers said in their letter to Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. “We urge your departments to work together to find a solution that will address concerns raised by stakeholders, protects the environment, and allows the Vineyard Wind project to remain viable.”

The call from federal officials echoes the intent of a rally held Thursday at Cape Cod Community College in West Barnstable, where conservationists joined with other Vineyard Wind supporters — such as union members, business people and faith groups — in a call for a break in the logjam.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Blue Harvest tipped as likely buyer of Carlos Rafael’s groundfish fleet

August 22, 2019 — Blue Harvest Fisheries, a US scallop and groundfish supplier backed by private equity Bregal Partners, is believed to have moved to the front of the pack in the chase to nab the 32 groundfish permits and 19 related draggers owned by Carlos Rafael in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

Quinn Fisheries, a longtime area scalloper, appears a lock, meanwhile, to land Rafael’s 11 scallop permits and related vessels, as previously reported.

The competition is on to acquire Rafael’s sizable commercial fishing operation following the civil settlement announced on Monday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Read the full story at Undercurrent News