Saving Seafood

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford heritage center to highlight women’s roles in fishing industry

March 10, 2021 — Years before the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center was established, the city’s annual two-day Working Waterfront Festival in 2007 focused on women and their role in the commercial fishing industry.

Laura Orleans, executive director of the center who was involved in the festival planning, said a man on the planning committee had asked if the festival would be all about fishermen’s wives, as that was what he thought about women in the industry.

Women who are married to fishermen serve an important role, but they have many other roles, Orleans said. They own and captain boats, process fish, study fisheries as scientists, make fishing gear, do the bookkeeping, serve as observers for fisheries management and act as some of the strongest advocates for the industry.

This reality will be the focus of the center’s new project, “Women’s Work: At Sea, On Shore, At Home, In the Community.” Programming starts this month and will culminate in a new exhibit on women scheduled to open late this summer.

Read the full story at Wicked Local

Vineyard Wind opens door to more offshore projects

March 10, 2021 — When the Interior Department released an environmental study for Vineyard Wind this week, it established a template for permitting additional offshore wind facilities in the United States.

Now it will be put to the test.

Vineyard Wind is one of 12 projects proposed along the Eastern Seaboard. Together, they have the potential to reshape Eastern power markets and bolster U.S. climate efforts.

Initial reaction to the environmental study, the first for an offshore wind facility, split sharply between supporters and detractors. The fishing industry said the study confirmed its fears that it would be pushed aside in a gold rush for renewable energy.

Wind interests and state officials said the final study was more robust than a draft version released in 2018, and they said projects in the pipeline would learn from Vineyard Wind’s turbulent approval.

“This project, in addition to having to go first in terms of setting a price and other factors, has established a template for figuring out the thornier issues in terms of siting, permitting and pipeline supply chain,” said Kathleen Theoharides, the Massachusetts secretary of energy and environmental affairs.

Massachusetts is one of several East Coast states that have contracted for large amounts of offshore wind. It has committed to purchasing 3,200 megawatts by 2035, with Vineyard Wind providing the first 800 MW.

New Jersey is seeking 7,500 MW of offshore wind power by 2035, and New York has plans for 9,000 MW.

Read the full story at E&E News

MASSACHUSETTS: Wind Farm Off Martha’s Vineyard Near Approval

March 10, 2021 — The following is an excerpt from a segment that ran on NBC Boston:

On Monday, the U.S. Department of the Interior completed Vineyard Wind’s environmental impact assessment. With the completion of this assessment, Vineyard Wind has edged closer to completion. Groups representing the seafood industry from across the Atlantic coast have expressed concern that it may lead to restrictions on large portions of valuable fishing grounds.

“There’s proposals all up and down the East Coast to occupy massive acreage of ocean bottom. So, that’s going to be a problem for fishermen,” said Eric Hansen, a local scallop fisherman from New Bedford.

New Bedford Mayor Jon Mitchell expressed that “it will take a lot of communication over the next several months to make sure that the wind farm and the fishermen can safely co-exist.”

Watch the full video here

MASSACHUSETTS: Chatham, feds reach truce on disputed fishing rights

March 10, 2021 — With the keystroke of an electronic signature, the Select Board signaled an end Monday night to seven years of bitter wrangling with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over control of fisheries in the waters off Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge.

The board signed a memorandum of understanding that codified the relationship that exists now between the town and the federal agency in which Chatham continues to manage fisheries for clams, oysters and scallops in the disputed area — and the two parties agree to work together on future changes as new fisheries or fishing technologies emerge.

“This memorandum of understanding creates a process to ensure the sustainable management of fishery resources that have been so important to our town and ensures our town will continue to manage these fisheries consistent with past practices,” board Chair Shareen Davis said. The agreement does continue a ban on harvesting mussels, which are eaten by migrating waterfowl.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

As project nears final approval, Vineyard Wind hopes to have offshore wind farm up and running by 2023

March 9, 2021 — An offshore wind project that would provide clean energy to nearly all of southeastern Massachusetts is one step closer to becoming a reality.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) released its final environmental review of the Vineyard Wind project Monday, which included a favorable assessment of the proposal.

Vineyard Wind’s proposed 84-turbine offshore wind farm would generate 800 megawatts of clean energy and power 400,000 homes. The company said it would be the first large-scale offshore wind farm energy project in the country.

“More than three years of federal review and public comment is nearing its conclusion and 2021 is poised to be a momentous year for our project and the broader offshore wind industry,” Vineyard Wind CEO Lars Pedersen said in a statement. “We look forward to reaching the final step in the federal permitting process and being able to launch an industry that has such tremendous potential for economic development in communities up and down the Eastern seaboard.”

Read the full story at WPRI

BARRY RICHARD: Biden’s Rush to Put Windmills Off Massachusetts’ Coast

March 9, 2021 — It didn’t take long for area fishermen to realize that Joe Biden is not their friend.

Biden, or whoever is calling the shots these days in Washington, rushed through a review of the Vineyard Wind offshore wind farm, moving the project, expected to be online by the end of 2023, closer to becoming a reality.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, an arm of the U.S. Department of the Interior, says it has completed the project’s final environmental impact statement. The project now moves to the final permitting phase.

President Donald Trump slowed the review process over concerns about the negative impacts an offshore wind farm could have on the commercial and recreational fishing industries. Fishermen say the wind farm, some 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, would pose navigational hazards and negatively impact marine life resulting in higher prices for seafood and lost jobs.

Read the full opinion piece at WBSM

BOEM finalizes environmental statement on Vineyard Wind

March 9, 2021 — Moving quickly on the Biden administration’s renewable energy agenda, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management completed its environmental review of the 800-megawatt Vineyard Wind plan, clearing the path for the first truly commercial-scale U.S. offshore wind project.

“The United States is poised to become a global clean energy leader,” said Laura Daniel Davis, a deputy assistant secretary in the Department of Interior, in announcing the step Monday. “To realize the full environmental and economic benefits of offshore wind, we must work together to ensure all potential development is advanced with robust stakeholder outreach and scientific integrity.”

Located about 15 nautical miles off Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., Vineyard Wind is viewed as a bellwether for the nascent U.S. offshore wind industry. Its rapid progress in recent weeks is a 180-degree turnaround from December, when Trump administration appointees at Interior moved to kill the permitting process.

Wind industry analysts have predicted BOEM approval would trigger new investment commitments to building out a U.S.-flag wind energy workboat fleet and East Coast port improvements to accommodate up to 15 other projects now in various planning stages.

For the fishing industry, the outcome of the Vineyard Wind approval is a critical test of how the Biden administration will handle its concerns going forward.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

As Vineyard Wind moves toward approval, a wave builds behind it

March 9, 2021 — A huge wind farm off the Massachusetts coast is edging closer to federal approval, setting up what the Biden administration hopes will be a model for a sharp increase in offshore wind energy development along the East Coast.

The Vineyard Wind project, south of Martha’s Vineyard, would create 800 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 400,000 homes in New England. If approved, the $2 billion project would be the first utility-scale wind power development in federal waters. A smaller offshore wind farm — the nation’s first — operates near Block Island in waters controlled by the State of Rhode Island.

Andrew Minkiewicz, an attorney for the Fisheries Survival Fund, which advocates for the sea scallop fishing industry, said the group has concerns about the abrupt shift in attitude from the Trump administration to Biden.

The project appeared dead — or at least on indefinite pause — as recently as last year, “and the new administration comes in and says no, we’re going to go ahead,” Minkiewicz said. “If this were not a clean-energy project, I think there would be an absolute uproar.”

Fishing groups from Maine to Florida have expressed fear that large offshore wind projects could render huge swaths of the ocean off-limits to their catch. While Vineyard Wind is not located in an area critical to the scallop fishery, other potential sites along the Atlantic coast could pose a major threat to scallopers, Minkiewicz said.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Providence Journal

Legal Sea Foods considers appeal after losing insurance case

March 9, 2021 — Legal Sea Foods is “considering its options” after a federal judge ruled against the seafood restaurant chain on its COVID-19 insurance case, the company’s attorney told SeafoodSource.

The Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A.-based foodservice chain, which became embroiled in a separate controversy last month involving its creditors, sued Strathmore Insurance Company in May 2020 over failure to cover business losses Legal Sea Foods incurred from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Feds Complete Final Environmental Review Of Vineyard Wind, Set To Be First Major Offshore Wind Project In U.S.

March 9, 2021 — Federal officials have completed the environmental review of the Vineyard Wind I offshore wind project that is expected to deliver clean renewable energy to Massachusetts by the end of 2023.

The U.S. Department of the Interior said Monday morning that its Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) completed the analysis it resumed about a month ago and will officially publish notice of the project’s final environmental impact statement in the Federal Register later this week.

The 800-megawatt wind farm planned for 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard was the first offshore wind project selected by Massachusetts utility companies with input from the Baker administration to fulfill part of a 2016 clean energy law.

Read the full story at WBUR