Saving Seafood

John Sackton: Trump Order on Offshore Drilling is a Political Stunt More Than a Real Theat to Fisheries

January 5, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — We have been deluged with press releases and new stories this morning reacting to the executive order by President Trump opening up virtually all US coastal waters to oil drilling.

This is something that has been opposed for more than 50 years by both the fisheries and tourism industries, and is opposed by all coastal states except for Alaska, and those in the Gulf of Mexcio where drilling is already taking place.

We doubt this decision will stand.

First of all, the oil markets are not signaling any strong interest in offshore drilling, although they do want the political payoff from the administration of opening up public lands in protected areas within the continental US.

Oil analysts say that current and projected prices simply don’t support expansion of offshore drilling into new expensive areas.  The Shell project to do a test site in the Beaufort Sea off the North Slope of Alaska ended in humiliating failure, as they could not even get the rig into place.  After spending $7 billiion, Shell has withdrawn its interest.

Secondly, drilling has is a long term time horizon.  It will take about 18 months for rules to be in place; then if there were leases, it would take ten years or so for exploration and development.  During this time, the political equation in Washington is very likely to shift back to the consensus that has existed for 40 or 50 years, which is that fisheries and tourism are more important to the US economy than the oil companies.

Third, the US is now on track to produce a record amount of oil, surpassing the previous highest output in 1970.  This is all due to improved technology for land based recovery.  Why oil companies would turn from their successful fracking model that is bringing old wells to life to a far more risky offshore strategy makes no economic sense.

Finally, with the exception of Alaska, Texas, and Louisiana, virtually all other coastal states are vehemently opposed to offshore drilling.  Florida lost billions of dollars in the Deep Water Horizon disaster, and no Florida politician can survive who does not protect that state from offshore drilling.

Likewise, California experienced the Santa Barbara channel spill that turned the entire state against offshore drilling there, and it is highly unlikely that the state would allow the regulatory process to proceed to bring oil ashore.

In Massachusetts, there is a long running international moratorium in drilling on Georges Bank, and again, the local opposition to any oil company attempting to use a lease would be ferocious.

Given the lack of economic return, no oil company is going to take up this fight for any reason other than to gain political points with Trump.  That is not a good position on which to base a long term strategy.

The one state where this might make a difference in Alaska, where the state budget is dependent on oil, and has been hit more than anywhere else by the global oil glut and the turn to natural gas and solar.  Alaska is desperate to gain more drilling, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski succeeded in getting a provision opening ANWR  to oil drilling.  But no matter how much the current state government may want more drilling, the economics dictate where such drilling might take place, and it certainly does not appear to be offshore.

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

 

Coastal governors oppose Trump’s offshore drilling plan

January 5, 2018 — Governors along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts are opposing the Trump administration’s proposal to open almost all U.S. waters to oil and natural gas drilling.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke announced Thursday a draft proposal that would allow offshore drilling for crude oil and natural gas on the Atlantic Coast and in the Arctic, reversing the Obama’s administration’s block in those areas. It also permits drilling along the Pacific Coast as well as more possibilities in the Gulf of Mexico. Under the plan, spanning the years 2019 to 2024, more than 90 percent of the total acres on the Outer Continental Shelf would be made available for leasing.

Zinke said the Interior Department has identified 47 potential lease sales, including seven in the Pacific and nine off the Atlantic coast. That would mark a dramatic shift in policy, not just from the Obama era. The last offshore lease sale for the East Coast was in 1983 and for the West Coast in 1984.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican and ally of President Trump, quickly said no thanks to Zinke’s plan, citing drilling as a threat to the state’s tourism industry.

Read the full story at the Washington Examiner

 

Trump proposes massive expansion of offshore drilling

January 4, 2018 — The Trump administration is proposing to greatly expand the areas available for offshore oil and natural gas drilling, including off the Pacific and Atlantic coasts.

In the first major step toward the administration’s promised expansion of offshore drilling, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said nearly all of the nation’s outer continental shelf is being considered for drilling, including areas off the coasts of Maine, California, Florida and Alaska.

The proposal, which environmentalists immediately panned as an environmental disaster and giveaway to the fossil fuel industry, is far larger than what was envisioned in President Trump’s executive order last year seeking a new plan for the future of auctions of offshore drilling rights. That order asked Zinke to consider drilling expansions in the Atlantic and Arctic oceans.

“This is a start on looking at American energy dominance and looking at our offshore assets and beginning a dialogue of when, how, where and how fast those offshore assets should be, or could be, developed,” Zinke told reporters Thursday.

Read the full story at The Hill

North Carolina asks firms for seismic information

January 2, 2018 — RALEIGH, N.C. — The state Division of Coastal Management (DCM) has asked four companies to submit more information about proposed seismic testing for offshore oil and gas because the original proposals did not consider the latest scientific studies on the harmful effects to marine life.

According to a press release from the division, documentation to show that the companies’ plans are consistent with state coastal management rules were submitted and approved in 2015.

However, the administration of then-President Barack Obama did not approve the testing, and removed waters off North Carolina and the rest of the East Coast from the offshore drilling plan for 2017-22.

Many local governments along the coast, including Emerald Isle, Morehead City, Atlantic Beach and Beaufort, had urged the president not to OK testing and drilling.

Since then, however, President Donald Trump has restarted the process and directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to develop a new offshore drilling plan, expanding the years it would be valid.

According to the DCM release, additional seismic studies have since been conducted and suggest that shipboard seismic airgun arrays can significantly affect marine life.

Spectrum Geo Inc., GX Technology, MCNV Marine North America and TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Co. all want permission to tow arrays of the airguns behind ships, sending pulses to the ocean floor to locate oil and gas deposits.

DCM sent the companies letters requiring more information supporting their position that the plans meet state coastal policies.

Southport resident Randy Sturgill, who helped coordinate local and statewide anti-drilling-and-testing opposition efforts in North Carolina for Oceana, an international conservation group, said Friday it was good to see that the state “has its finger on the pulse,” not only on state residents’ feelings about offshore seismic testing and oil and gas drilling, but also on the latest science about the testing.

Read the full story at the Carteret County News-Times

 

Fishing leaders: Has the Monterey Bay sanctuary kept its promise?

December 22, 2017 — The answer is no, not to fishermen; please let us explain.

Reflect back to 1992 when the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary was proposed. While fishermen and most others agreed that it could help prevent offshore oil development, we had concerns about how sanctuary authority might affect those of us who provide food from ocean resources.

There was also public discussion about how stakeholders would have a say in the new federal bureaucracy. Commercial fishermen and recreational anglers had killed two earlier sanctuary proposals over these concerns.

In response, fishermen heard that the new sanctuary would not threaten our livelihoods or create fishing regulations. It was a broad assurance, and repeated often by both elected and NOAA officials. Based on this, fishing leaders weren’t neutral, they supported it, even traveling to Washington, D.C.

This promise was never a free-pass from fishing regulations. Rather, it acknowledged that fishery laws, such as the Magnuson-Stevens Act, already provided science-based management. Under that law, overfishing has ended on the West Coast, and several thousands of square miles of quality habitat are protected. It also acknowledged that sanctuaries are not intended to manage fisheries.

The promise is written into the sanctuary’s designation document. If any problem arose, the sanctuary would work with us for a solution.

Read the full editorial at the Santa Cruz Sentinel

 

Bill could make drilling off N.C. coast more likely

December 5, 2017 — WASHINGTON — Congress is considering a bill that would expedite seismic testing and create a revenue sharing system for offshore drilling off the coasts of several states, including North Carolina.

The plan, H.R. 4239, dubbed the “SECURE American Energy Act,” has been met with criticism by environmental groups, but is in line with the Trump administration’s stated goals of expediting offshore energy exploration. It has been passed by the House Committee on Natural Resources, but has yet to receive a vote by the full chamber.

Congress would, according to the bill, have the sole power to establish moratoriums on offshore drilling and create National Marine Monuments. In markup documents, the bill is described as helping offshore operators who need significant advance warning help plan their future projects, allowing for more production.

Oceana, which has been involved in anti-drilling and seismic campaigns in Southeastern North Carolina, has criticized the package. The organization has expressed specific concerns about the parts of the bill looking at the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

Read the full story at the Wilmington Star

 

Proposed law could mean more drilling off California coast

November 27, 2017 — ORANGE COUNTY, California — Many of the 27 oil platforms drilling into the underwater shelf off the coast from Santa Barbara to Huntington Beach are decades old and, in the eyes of the oil industry and others, ready to be shut down.

Some cost big money to operate at a time of sagging oil prices. Others need expensive technical upgrades. And all are political targets, widely viewed in a liberal state as bigger environmental risks than the potential reward of pulling yet more carbon-generating oil from the Earth.

But the rigs also represent potential profit. By some estimates at least one billion barrels of oil remain untapped in the shelf off of Southern California, much of it accessible from federal waters, not the state-controlled areas within three miles of the coastline.

And that risk vs. profit conflict — plus Trump-era politics — is why lawmakers representing California are clashing with federal regulators over proposed legislation known as the Strengthening the Economy with Critical Untapped Resources to Expand American Energy Act.

Proponents say the SECURE American Energy Act will create high-wage jobs by making it easier for oil companies to work on federal land and in federal waters, all with less federal oversight.

Read the full story at The Orange County Register

Fight to halt oil, gas exploration plan in Atlantic goes bipartisan

September 16, 2017 — State and federal lawmakers from both parties have joined East Coast business interests to persuade the Trump administration to halt its plan for fossil fuel development in the Atlantic Ocean.

It’s a surprisingly diverse collection of power players: members of Congress, dozens of lawmakers from both red and blue states, nine attorneys general, six governors and thousands of business owners from Florida through the Carolinas and up to New Jersey.

They hope that mix and their economic, not environmental, argument will sway President Trump’s Interior Department as it nears a decision on testing that could open the door to oil and gas exploration, and eventually drilling, off the coast.

“The wall of opposition that has been built up to Atlantic drilling and seismic testing is amazing,” said Frank Knapp, chief executive of the South Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce and president of the Business Alliance for Protecting the Atlantic Coast, an organization supported by more than 41,000 businesses and 500,000 commercial fishing families on the East Coast.

Environmental groups have worked for years to stop oil and gas development, focusing on the threat it poses to coastal marine life. Lawmakers and business leaders, however, are raising concerns about the economic effect that seismic testing and drilling could have on the multibillion-dollar coastal tourism and fishing industries.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

 

Trump administration nears decision that sets stage for offshore drilling in the Atlantic

September 11, 2017 — Environmental groups are bracing for the Trump administration to approve controversial testing along the Eastern seaboard that would mark a significant step toward offshore drilling in waters off the coast of Florida all the way north to the Delaware Bay.

Five geophysical survey companies are seeking federal permission to shoot pressurized air blasts into the ocean every 10 to 12 seconds around the clock for weeks and months at a time, seeking fossil fuel deposits beneath the Atlantic Ocean floor.

The testing, which would cover 330,000 square miles of ocean, faces fierce opposition from environmental groups and local officials due to the possible economic and environmental effects.

Because the underwater blasts are louder than a Saturn V rocket launch and can be heard by monitoring devices more than 2,500 miles away, scientists fear long-term exposure to the noise could cause hearing loss and impair breeding, feeding, foraging and communication activity among dolphins, endangered whales, other marine mammals and sea turtles.

Some worry the blasts could cause mother whales and their calves to become separated. Commercial and recreational fisheries could also be affected if fish change their breeding and spawning habits to avoid the noise. Others fear disoriented marine life could collide with the vessels that tug the air guns or become entangled in their lines. Oceana, an international conservation group, estimates that 138,000 marine mammals could be injured in the testing process.

Seventy-five marine scientists asked the Obama administration in 2015 to reject seismic air gun testing in the Atlantic because of these threats. Twenty-eight marine biologists did the same in 2016 over concerns that testing would harm the estimated 500 endangered North Atlantic right whales.

“That’s the species we are most concerned about,” said Doug Nowacek, associate professor of conservation technology at the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, North Carolina. “They are in decline. They live coastally along the U.S. They were hunted (by whalers) and they were slowly recovering. And now they’re starting to decline again.”

Read the full story from the McClatchy Company at the Miami Herald

North Carolina submits formal comments in opposition to offshore drilling

August 21, 2017 — Gov. Roy Cooper and the Department of Environmental Quality submitted formal comments yesterday to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to convey North Carolina’s opposition to oil and gas leasing for offshore drilling on North Carolina’s coast.

“Because offshore drilling threatens North Carolina’s critical coastal industries and unique coastal environment with limited benefits for our citizens, it is a bad deal for North Carolina,” Cooper wrote in the letter. “Accordingly, I ask that you respect the wishes of our state and maintain in the new OCS Leasing Plan the current prohibition of oil and gas drilling off North Carolina’s coast.”

Coastal tourism generates $3 billion annually in North Carolina and supports more than 30,000 jobs in the eastern part of the state. Commercial fishing also brings in hundreds of millions of dollars to the state every year.

Read the full story at Island Free Press