Saving Seafood

News for the New England Region

RHODE ISLAND: R.I. energy regulators approve SouthCoast Wind transmission line plan

November 5, 2025 — The financing and federal permitting for SouthCoast Wind remains murky.

But the path is clear for the Massachusetts offshore wind project to run power lines up the Sakonnet River and across Portsmouth to Mount Hope Bay, with approval from the Rhode Island Energy Facility Siting Board on Tuesday.

Power purchase agreements between the project developer and Massachusetts and Rhode Island utility suppliers are not yet signed — despite a Nov. 1 deadline — amid continued uncertainty over the staying power of offshore wind under the Trump administration.

Meanwhile, a federal judge in D.C. granted the administration’s request Tuesday to reconsider a key federal permit which was already approved in the waning days of the Biden administration. The court decision marks a major setback to the already struggling project, allowing the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to start anew on a comprehensive review of potential environmental and economic consequences of the project.

A spokesperson for SouthCoast Wind did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the court order Tuesday afternoon.

Read the full article at Rhode Island Current

Trump Can Reconsider Permit for Offshore Wind Farm, Judge Rules

November 5, 2025 — A federal judge in Washington ruled on Tuesday that the Trump administration may reconsider the Biden-era approval of SouthCoast Wind, a wind farm planned off the coast of Nantucket, Mass.

The decision dealt a setback to the developers of the project, a joint venture between the energy companies EDP Renewables and ENGIE. And it handed a victory to the White House, which has ordered a half-dozen federal agencies to draft plans to thwart offshore wind power, a source of renewable energy that President Trump has criticized as ugly, expensive and inefficient.

Judge Tanya S. Chutkan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia wrote that the project developers would not “suffer immediate and significant hardship” if the Trump administration were allowed to reconsider the permit.

The decision would effectively allow the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to re-evaluate its approval of the project’s construction and operations plan. The agency had approved the plan on Jan. 17, 2025, three days before Mr. Trump’s second term began.

Read the full article at The New York Times

New England lobster populations fall amid overfishing

November 4, 2025 — Overfishing of American lobster is occurring in New England’s most productive fishing areas off the coasts of Maine and Massachusetts, contributing to a 34 percent population drop since the last assessment in 2020, regulators found in a new report.

The findings, released Thursday by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, will not result in an immediate change of lobster management, officials said. But they point to a broader concern around the viability of New England lobster, which are declining at an ever-faster rate across their traditional cold-water habitat.

Maine, which produces 93 percent of the nation’s lobster, saw a record-low harvest of 86 million pounds in 2024, according to state data, down 35 percent from 2016 when fishermen hauled in a record 132 million pounds of lobster. Massachusetts has seen comparable drops, while lobster harvests in southern New England have seen the steepest declines.

Read the full article at E&E News

New assessment shows Gulf of Maine lobster stock is declining and overfishing is occurring

November 3, 2025 — For the first time, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has issued an assessment that finds that overfishing is occurring in the lobster stock in Northern New England waters. And regulators are recommending a re-evaluation of management strategies for the lucrative resource.

Most of the lobsters Americans eat are caught in the Gulf of Maine, and Maine’s lobster fishery is one of the most valuable seafood industries in the country. But there are more signals that the fishery is changing, fast.

Tracy Pugh, a fisheries biologist with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries and the chair of the Commission’s technical committee, presented the results of the new 2025 lobster stock assessment to the American Lobster Management Board this week in Delaware.

And she says according to their models, the abundance of lobsters in the Gulf of Maine and George’s Bank area has declined 34% since its peak in 2018, and is now approaching levels last seen around fifteen years ago.

Read the full article at Maine Public

UMassD-SMAST partners with New Bedford Port Authority to study the effects of wind energy areas on commercial fishing operations

November 3, 2025 — The UMass Dartmouth School for Marine Science & Technology (SMAST) is partnering with the New Bedford Port Authority on a project titled “Tracking and Modeling the Behavior and Position of Fishing Vessels and Their Towed Gears in Wind Energy Areas.” The project is funded by a $419,462 grant from the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (MassCEC).

The study will examine how commercial fishing vessels and gear operate within and around offshore wind energy areas to better understand potential impacts and identify ways to support safe, sustainable coexistence between the fishing and wind industries.

SMAST was selected as a key partner for its longstanding reputation in collaborative fisheries research and its strong connections to the commercial fishing community as well as its leadership in studying the impacts of wind farms on fisheries. Together, SMAST and the NBPA will combine practical experience and scientific analysis to help shape offshore wind development that supports both economic growth and ocean sustainability.

Read the full article at UMass Dartmouth

Lobster populations off New England coast are declining, report shows

October 31, 2025 — Lobster populations off the coast of New England have dropped 34 percent since 2018, according to a new report from the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

The findings are raising fresh questions about the long-term outlook for Maine’s lobster industry.

Off the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank, the commission said the current population is at 201 million lobsters, which is below the target of 229 million but still comfortably above the “depleted” threshold of 143 million. That means the stock is not considered depleted, but the decline is notable.

“The number of lobsters in the population has gone down since the last assessment,” said Caitlin Starks, senior coordinator for the commission’s Fishery Management Plan. “Overfishing is occurring, but just barely.”

Read the full article at News Center Maine

Lobster Population Falls off New England, Leading Regulators to Declare Overfishing

October 31, 2025 — A new report says America’s lobsters, which have been in decline since 2018, are now being overfished off New England.

The stock has declined by 34% since that year in its most important fishing grounds, the regulatory Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission said Thursday. The commission said it now considers overfishing of the species to be occurring, and that could bring new management measures that restrict fishermen from catching them in the future.

But the lobster population has shown “rapid declines in abundance in recent years,” the commission said in a statement.

The assessment said the decline and overfishing were taking place in fishing areas off Maine and Massachusetts where most lobster fishing takes place. The assessment also considered the southern New England lobster stock, which it said has been depleted for years and remains so.

Read the full article at U.S. News

Stock assessment for US lobster shows population shifts, minor overfishing

October 31, 2025 — A recent stock assessment by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) indicates lobster stock on the East Coast of the U.S. is depleted to record low abundance in Southern New England (SNE), and overfishing of the stock is occurring in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank (GOM/GBK).

The lobster benchmark assessment found the stock in GOM/GBK – which accounts for the vast majority of lobster landings in the U.S. – has declined 34 percent since peak levels in 2018. According to the ASMFC, the GOM region in particular has accounted for an average of 82 percent of annual landings since 1982, while the GBK fishery accounts for 5 percent.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Fisheries commission again holds fire on striped bass limits

October 31, 2025 — With a glimmer of hopeful news about harvest pressure and a warning from commercial fishermen that their economic survival is at stake, East Coast fishery managers have pulled back from ordering another round of catch restrictions on struggling Atlantic striped bass.

Meeting in Dewey Beach, DE, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission voted Oct. 29 not to require any additional cuts in either the recreational or commercial catch of the migratory finfish known as rockfish in the Chesapeake Bay.

The vote against tightening already-strict catch limits came after more than a year of debate by the panel, which regulates nearshore fishing on migratory species along the Atlantic coast. Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut and North Carolina voted for more restrictions.

Widely regarded as the most prized finfish in the Chesapeake and along the Atlantic Coast, striped bass were declared overfished in 2019, with the number of large female fish below what was needed to sustain the population. The commission responded by ordering a series of catch reductions in ensuing years aiming to rebuild the stock by 2029.

Read the full article at Bay Journal