Saving Seafood

Scallop fishermen seek buffer zone around New York Bight wind power areas

July 27, 2021 — Plans to open more of the New York Bight to offshore wind development will threaten the East Coast scallop fishing industry that brings in more than $425 million in dockside value annually and much more to the larger U.S. economy, fishing advocates say.

They say one immediate step should be creating a 5-nautical mile buffer zone between the southeastern edge of the Hudson South Lease Area that’s been proposed by the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, and the Hudson Canyon Access Area, highly productive scallop grounds that have supported the industry’s immense success over the last 20 years.

In the late 1990s, fishing pressure, declining scallop numbers and fishermen catching smaller scallops brought the fishery to crisis. But fishermen, scientists and regulators regrouped, creating a system of rotational scallop area management that federal scientists say has added more than $1 billion in revenue to coastal communities.

The Biden administration drive to develop more offshore wind, avidly supported by state governments in New York and New Jersey, will threaten that progress, representatives of the Fisheries Survival Fund and the port of New Bedford, Mass., told BOEM officials in a July 20 online conference, the group said.

“Proposed lease areas need to be thoroughly re-evaluated to reduce impacts to scallops and scallop fishermen, who operate in the most valuable federally managed fishery,” according to a statement issued by the group this week.

The proposed buffer zone would create a 5-nautical-mile strip inside BOEM’s mapped Hudson South wind energy area, standing off any future turbine construction from the southeastern edge that borders the Hudson Canyon scallop access area, said David Frulla, a lawyer with the Washington, D.C., firm Kelley Drye & Warren, which has represented the fund and other fishing groups.

“The buffer zone’s purpose is to make sure there is not a wind farm hard up against an access area,” said Frulla.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

NEW YORK: Scallop Disaster Declared, But Some Hope for 2022

July 22, 2021 — Ask any bayman, and all would agree that the bay scallop fishery in the Peconic Bay estuary system in the past two years was a total calamity. As such, it was no surprise to learn that the United States Department of Commerce recently declared the events of 2019-20 a fishery disaster.

The declaration makes the fishery eligible for disaster assistance from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Baymen may also qualify for disaster assistance from the Small Business Administration, according to the Department of Commerce. The department has balances remaining from previously appropriated fishery disaster assistance and will determine the appropriate allocation for the Peconic Bay fishery, which can also include funding of habitat restoration and additional research efforts.

“Fisheries are essential to our communities and economy, and we want to ensure America is in a position to remain competitive on the global stage,” U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said in a statement. “These determinations allow us to lend a helping hand to the fishing families and communities that have experienced very real and difficult setbacks in the last few years.”

But there is also some good news, for now, regarding the popular bivalve. While it’s still early, there have been no signs of a die-off this summer among scallops that were spawned last year, according to Stephen Tettelbach, a Long Island University ecology professor who heads Cornell Cooperative Extension’s Peconic Bay Scallop Restoration Program. Dr. Tettelbach’s team conducts periodic dives of the bottomland in several locations during the year to check on the status of the growing scallops.

Dr. Tettelbach was equally enthused about the number of larval scallops in local waters. “We did the first sampling of our larval spat collectors last Monday and saw the largest scallop set in the last 17 years,” he said. “There are small bugs all over the bays.” Small or newly-hatched scallops are commonly called “bugs.”

Read the full story at The East Hampton Star

NEW YORK: Mixed reviews for South Shore wind farm

July 19, 2021 — If Long Beach residents are concerned about a private company’s $3 billion proposal to build a 174-turbine wind farm 15 miles off the South Shore, few of them voiced it at a virtual hearing on the matter on July 8.

Only a handful of people commented at the second hearing held by the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on a proposal by the Norway-based Equinor to build the Empire Wind project.

Equinor has been awarded contracts by New York state, the first of which was granted in 2019 to supply 816 megawatts of power to the state grid, connecting in Brooklyn. A second contract, for 1,260 megawatts, was awarded in January for Long Island’s South Shore.

What is key for Long Beach is a part of the project that calls for two offshore substations to collect the power, which would be routed by cables to one or more of several potential sites in Brooklyn. A Long Beach cable would also be connected to an Equinor substation, and to the Long Island Power Authority grid by way of a substation in Island Park. That cable could run under the barrier island.

Long Beach would not be involved in the overall approval process, but would have a say in the underground cable’s location.

Read the full story at the Long Island Herald

NEW YORK: Study finding early signs of hope for Peconic scallop fishery

July 16, 2021 — Scientists studying the early stages of bay scallop growth are finding encouraging signs this year, after two years of scallop die-offs that recently led the federal government to declare a disaster in the Peconic Bay fishery.

Scallops can lay up to 2 million eggs when they spawn in the period of June to August, and this year’s larval scallops will go on to make up the breeding stock for next summer’s spawn.

An expanded survey of scallops being funded by New York state and conducted by the Cornell Cooperative Extension and Stony Brook University is finding higher levels of larval scallops than has been seen in 17 years, said Stephen Tettelbach, a shellfish ecologist for Cornell.

“It’s way beyond anything we’ve ever seen in terms of larval settlement,” said Tettelbach. “It shattered all records we’ve seen in 17 years by far.”

Just as encouraging, Tettelbach said, researchers haven’t seen the summer die-offs of adult scallops that they they saw in the previous two years, a die-off that amounted to 50% of the population by the end of June and 100% in some areas by the end of July. “So far we haven’t seen any big die-offs,” he said.

Read the full story at Newsday

Empire Wind plans power delivery to New York in 2025

July 13, 2021 — Electricity from the Equinor and BP Empire Wind project should start coming into New York’s power grid in 2025, according to updated plans the joint venture has filed with the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

The first offshore wind energy project laid out for the New York Bight is a 79,350-acre tract, shaped like a slice of pizza wedged between two of the ship traffic separation lanes in the New York Harbor approaches.

With the enormous volume of vessel traffic in the region – container vessels at the port of New York and New Jersey, coastwise tug and barge tows, plus commercial and recreational fishing fleets – navigation has been the foremost issue since New York state energy planners first began looking to ocean wind as a power source.

“There is certainly a concern about setback” from the shipping traffic lanes, said Lucas Feinberg, a project manager with BOEM, during a July 8 online virtual public scoping session hosted by the agency.

Early on, planners agreed to a 1-nautical mile setback along the Empire Wind frontage along the shipping lanes. Formally known on charts as traffic separation schemes, the lanes fan out from the New York Harbor entrance at Ambrose Light.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

NEW YORK: Peconic Bay Scallop Die-Off On Long Island Leads To Federal Disaster Declaration

July 13, 2021 — Federal regulators have declared a fishery disaster following a massive scallop die-off over the last two years in eastern Long Island.

Nearly 90% of Peconic Bay scallops died off because of parasitic disease, an invasive predator and warming waters due to climate change.

Barley Dunne, who runs the shellfish hatchery in East Hampton, said he hopes sets of scallops can make a comeback.

“Last year, there was a huge set from Flanders in Riverhead all the way out to Montuak. And right now there are tons of beautiful 1-year-old bay scallops at the bottom. So, the big question is whether they are going to make it through the summer. Because that’s when the die-off is occurring,” Dunne said.

Read the full story at WSHU

Proposed Offshore Wind Projects Could Cost NJ Tourism Billions, Says LBI Rental Business Owner

June 30, 2021 — Citing a University of North Carolina study, the founder of Vacation Rentals LBI said the economic impact of proposed offshore wind farms to be located off the coast of Long Beach Island would be in the billions and half of all tourism dollars in New Jersey.

Ship Bottom resident Duane Watlington’s comments came during the online June 23 LBI Coalition for Wind Without Impact forum in which more than 200 individuals tuned in to hear speakers discuss environmental, socio-economic and recreational fishing concerns. His business portfolio also includes Vacation Rentals Ocean City, New Jersey, and Vacation Rentals Wildwood. All three businesses connect vacationers with rental homeowners and real estate agencies.

The UNC study found more than half of rental home vacationers would choose to rent elsewhere if wind turbines are visible from the shoreline, according to Watlington’s presentation.

The closest western, or inshore, boundary of the proposed Atlantic Shores lease site is 10 miles from Barnegat Light and 9 miles from Holgate. The lease area has the potential to generate 3 gigawatts of offshore wind energy.

The Jersey Shore is responsible for nearly half of the overall tourism dollars in the state and generated over $22 billion in 2019 alone, according to Watlington.

Based on information from the UNC study, he said, an offshore wind farm would have an economic impact of roughly $12 billion annually.

Read the full story at The Sand Paper

Secretary of Commerce Approves Disaster Declarations in Four U.S. Commercial Fisheries

June 29, 2021 — The following was released by NOAA:

U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina M. Raimondo announced today her determination that fishery disasters occurred in four fisheries in 2018, 2019, and 2020 — for two states, Alaska and New York, and for two Tribes, Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe and the Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis, in Washington.

“Fisheries are essential to our communities and economy and we want to ensure America is in a position to remain competitive on the global stage,” Secretary Raimondo said. “These determinations allow us to lend a helping hand to the fishing families and communities that have experienced very real and difficult setbacks in the last few years.”

The Secretary, working with NOAA Fisheries, evaluates each fishery disaster request based primarily on data submitted by the requesting state or tribe. A declared fishery disaster must meet specific requirements under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and/or the Interjurisdictional Fisheries Act. For example, there must be commercial fishery economic impacts and declines in fishery access or biomass resulting from specific allowable causes due to the fishery disaster event.

The Secretary found that the following fisheries met the requirements for a fishery disaster determination:

  • 2019 Norton Sound Red King Crab in Alaska
  • 2019/2020 Peconic Bay Scallop in New York
  • 2018 Port Gamble S’Klallam Puget Sound Coho Salmon in Washington
  • 2019 Chehalis and Black River Spring Chinook Salmon in Washington

Positive determinations make these fisheries eligible for disaster assistance from NOAA.They may also qualify for disaster assistance from the Small Business Administration. The Department of Commerce has balances remaining from previously appropriated fishery disaster assistance and will determine the appropriate allocation for these disasters.

The Secretary also determined, working with NOAA Fisheries, that red tides in Florida did not cause a fishery disaster for Florida fisheries between 2018 and 2019.

Learn more about fishery disaster assistance.

NEW YORK: In Tony Hamptons, Homeowners and Fishermen Fight Over a Beach

June 28, 2021 — A fight over access to a Hamptons beach is intensifying this summer, pitting wealthy homeowners seeking a serene oceanfront view against residents and local fishermen who want to drive trucks onto the sand.

People brought dozens of trucks onto the beach Sunday morning in violation of a court order prohibiting people from driving on a roughly 4,000-foot oceanfront stretch of East Hampton known locally as Truck Beach. Protesters drove the length of the beach displaying American flags during the roughly hour-and-a-half event. One protester carried a sign that read, “Support our local fishermen.”

Police took names of those coming onto the beach, but didn’t cite or arrest anyone, according to Daniel Rodgers, a lawyer for the fishermen. East Hampton town police didn’t respond to a request for comment. Protesters vowed more protests throughout the summer.

“We’ve caught a lot of fish on that beach, and I’m not going to stop doing it now because somebody doesn’t want to look at trucks,” said Danny Lester, a fisherman whose family for generations has worked the waters off this far southeastern part of Long Island, about 100 miles east of New York City. “If they stop us at the entrance and lock us up, so be it. We’re going down there, come hell or high water.”

Read the full story at The Wall Street Journal

Feds to begin review of wind farm off Long Beach

June 25, 2021 — A $3 billion proposal to build what would be New York state’s largest offshore wind farm is taking shape, with plans to run an underground cable through Long Beach to a substation near the E.F. Barrett Power Station in Island Park. A precise location for the cable has not yet been determined.

The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management will soon begin an environmental review of the construction and operation of what would be called Empire Wind, off Long Island’s South Shore. The review is expected to take two years, and the project would need state approval as well. Work on Empire Wind would begin no sooner than 2023. Long Beach would not be involved in the approval process, but would help determine the location of the underground cable.

The wind turbines would be about 15 miles offshore.

The Long Island Commercial Fishing Association is strongly opposed to the project, claiming that fish, and fishermen, will be adversely affected.

Equinor, a company based in Norway, has been awarded contracts by New York state, the first in 2019, to supply 816 megawatts of power to the state grid, connecting in Brooklyn. A second contract, for 1,260 megawatts, was awarded in January, for Long Island’s South Shore.

Read the full story at the LI Herald