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Belugas Are Dying off in Alaska and Oil and Gas Operations Are to Blame, Says Lawsuit

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 Jordan Davidson

Feb. 03, 2020 11:31AM ESTANIMALS

https://www.ecowatch.com/belugas-alaska-oil-gas-drilling-2645014948.html?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1

Two environmental groups made a formal announcement that they will file a lawsuit to protect endangered beluga whales whose numbers have plummeted recently, as the AP reported.

The suit aims to void permits allowed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that opened up oil and gas exploration in Cook Inlet in southern Alaska. The suit alleges that NOAA violated the Endangered Species Act by issuing the permits without protecting Cook Island belugas. The law requires the formal 60-day notice before the agency can be sued, according to The Associated Press.

The Center for Biological Diversity and Cook Inletkeeper teamed up to send notice that they will sue NOAA.

NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) released a disturbing new population estimate last week that showed whale numbers are far lower than previous estimates and their numbers are dropping rapidly, as Reuters reported.

The NMFS report estimated that only 279 beluga whales remain in Cook Inlet, a steep decline from the nearly 1,300 that lived there in 1979. The population decline has accelerated to an annual rate of 2.3 percent over the last decade, which is four times faster than previous estimates, according to NMFS, as Reuters reported.

Cook Inlet runs almost 200 miles from Anchorage to the Gulf of Alaska. It supplies energy for the south-central part of the state. The industrial activities there threaten beluga whales, which swim there and feast on salmon and other fish, according to The Independent.

The plaintiffs are demanding a new assessment of oil and gas exploration since the Trump administration used higher, inaccurate beluga whale numbers when it gave a permit to Hillcorp Alaska. The permit allows the petroleum company to “take” beluga whales as part of its operations. “Take” is a nebulous term that allows the company to harass and harm whales. The environmental groups want a guarantee that Cook Inlet belugas can recover from any of Hillcorp Alaska’s operations, according to The Associated Press.

“Since we pressed for listing the Cook Inlet Beluga whale as endangered in 2008, the drive for corporate profits and complacent government bureaucrats have conspired to stifle progress for this dwindling stock,” said Bob Shavelson, advocacy director for Cook Inletkeeper, in a statement. “Hilcorp should do the right thing and abandon its plans for new drilling in Cook Inlet.”

Last summer, the Trump administration loosened environmental regulations that allowed for new mining, oil and gas drilling where protected species live, according to The Independent.

“The tragic decline of these lovely little whales spotlights the risk of allowing oil exploration in their habitat,” said Julie Teel Simmonds, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, in a statement. “If we’re going to save these belugas, the Trump administration must cancel permission for the oil industry to use seismic blasting and pile driving in Cook Inlet. These animals are hanging on by a thread, and we can’t let them be hurt even more.”

The groups said that seismic blasting used in exploration and deep-sea mining causes blasts heard miles away. The blasts can register up to 250 decibels. For reference, standing next to a jackhammer is 100 decibels. Those underwater blasts can cause hearing loss in marine mammals, severely disrupt communication between pods, disturb feeding and breeding grounds, and reduce their ability to catch fish, according to the environmental groups, as The Associated Press reported.

Spillway Opening Partly Blamed For Over 200 Bottlenose Dolphin Deaths In Gulf of Mexico

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The alarming death of over 200 bottlenose dolphins in northern Gulf of Mexico, including Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida has got authorities concerned. Officials said 261 bottlenose dolphins were found stranded between Louisiana and the Florida Panhandle between February 1 and May 31, this year.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) confirmed that 98% of the dolphins were dead. The agency had declared this as an unusual mortality event (UME). NOAA defines UME as a stranding that is unexpected. It involves a significiant die-off of any marine mammal population and demands immediate response.

Erin Fougeres, a marine mammal stranding program administrator for NOAA said the number is three times the historical average in the northern gulf. “We are seeing higher numbers in Mississippi and Lousiana and we are concerned about fresh water. Its an exceptionally wet winter for the entire United States and its the wettest winter in the Mississippi Valley in the past 124 years,” he said, reports CNN.

Tourists watch bottlenose dolphins in Tamarin BayTourists watch bottlenose dolphins in Tamarin Bay on the West coast of Mauritius in a file photo. Photo: REUTERS

Fougeres said it is too early to say what was causing the deaths. Investigators are also looking at the salinity levels as bottlenose dolphins are usually found in waters with high saline levels. However, a Mississippi scientist said the spillway opening is partly to be blamed for the death of 126 dolphins across the Mississippi’s coastline. Experts attribute the dolphins’ death to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spilland to the Lousiana spillway opening, as well as food supply and wet winter.

Dog Saved By Workers On Oil Rig, 135 Miles Off Thai Coast

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The rescued dog appeared to be growing stronger on the oil rig before he made his journey back to shore.

Vitisak Payalaw

Workers on an oil rig about 135 miles offshore from southern Thailand noticed something stunning in the water: a dog.

The animal swam toward the rig’s platform on Friday and clung to it as team members tried to figure out how to save him, Vitisak Payalaw, an offshore planner for Chevron Thailand Exploration & Production, told NPR.

Video that Payalaw posted on Facebook shows the shivering animal partially submerged in water, staring up at the workers.

Payalaw said he and three members of his team spent 15 minutes working to secure the dog with a rope and pull him up to safety. They were racing against time, he said, because the seas were becoming rougher.

The oil rig workers used a rope to pull the dog to safety.

Vitisak Payalaw

In the first photos Payalaw posted, the dog looks exhausted — “especially on his eyes” — and despondent. Workers provided him with water and pieces of meat on the deck of the rig, and they set up a kennel for him indoors.

They named him Boonrod, Payalaw added, a word that means “he has done good karma and that helps him to survive.”

It’s not clear how the dog ended up so many miles offshore. Payalaw declined to speculate, simply saying it is still a mystery. The Bangkok Post said the pup is “believed to have fallen from a fishing trawler.”

Boonrod appeared to be steadily growing stronger, after eating and napping. After a day and a half, he looked happy and alert — and he was clearly popular with the oil rig team.

Boonrod poses with oil rig workers in the Gulf of Thailand.

Vitisak Payalaw

The pup has now been transferred to land, arriving in Thailand’s Songkhla province on Monday morning to receive veterinary care coordinated by the rescue group Watchdog Thailand. According to The Associated Press, the group has declared him “in good shape.”

Photos posted by the organization showed a triumphant-looking Boonrod being greeted by rescue group workers and veterinarians. They placed a fetching bright yellow floral wreath around his neck as Boonrod flashed a bright smile.

The dog was later shown receiving a bath, playing with admirers and eating treats.

Boonrod’s streak of good luck seems set to continue. Payalaw says he’s going to be working on the rig until the end of April, but when he gets back to shore, he plans to adopt the dog.

Act would dismantle marine mammal protection

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There is distressing news on the front page of the Monday, April 2, Los Angeles Times, which is relevant to animals off coasts all over the US. The headline and subheading read: “Sea life at risk as U.S. seeks to ease oil rules; Bills would speed up permits for seismic blasts and dismantle safeguards for whales.”

Environmental reporter Rosanna Xia opens with:

“The search for offshore oil begins with a boom.

“Before the oil rigs arrive and the boring begins, operators need to fire intense seismic blasts repeatedly into the ocean to find oil deposits.

“For decades, environmental rules that protected whales and other marine life from this cacophony have limited the location and frequency of these blasts — preventing oil companies from exploring, and therefore operating, off much of the nation’s coasts.

“Now these safeguards are quietly being dismantled.

“The push to overhaul seismic survey rules has not attracted the same public attention as the Trump administration’s interest in opening coastal waters to dozens of new drilling leases or downsizing protected marine areas. But it too could have wide implications beyond enabling new oil operations.

“Winding their way through Congress are two bills that supporters say would create jobs, reduce permitting delays and clear the way for naval activities and coastal restoration.

“But environmentalists call them a thinly veiled oil industry wish list that would upend established protections and fast-track the permitting process for oil exploration off the Atlantic, much of Alaska and even California.”

We are told of the bills, which are called the Streamlining Environmental Approvals Act:

“They target core provisions of the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which regulates seismic blasts used to locate oil and gas. The noise, scientists say, can disorient and damage the hearing of whales and dolphins so badly that they lose their ability to navigate and reproduce.”

The lengthy article also lets us know:

“There has been little movement on the bills since the SEA Act passed committee in January. But opponents are concerned it could be folded last-minute into this year’s military reauthorization or another must-pass bill.”

Front page coverage helps make that at least a little bit less likely. You can comment right below the article, which you will find on line at http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-marine-mammal-oil-drilling-20180402-story.html OR https://tinyurl.com/ydcal3v9 . And you can send appreciative letters to the editor that speak up for animals to letters@latimes.com
The article opens the door for them. Always include your full name, address and phone number when sending a letter to the editor.

 

Seismic Testing to Begin in Atlantic Ocean in Push for Offshore Drilling

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http://www.ecowatch.com/seismic-tesing-oil-drilling-2402920868.html
by Lorraine Chow

11 May

Seismic Testing to Begin in Atlantic Ocean in Push for Offshore Drilling

The Interior Department announced it is moving forward with seismic surveys in the Atlantic Ocean following President Donald Trump‘s executive order last month to aggressively expand offshore drilling in protected areas off the Arctic and Atlantic oceans.

Six permit applications by energy companies—ones that were rejected by the Obama administration—are being reviewed by the department.

The oil and gas industry has long pushed for seismic surveys used to search for oil and gas deposits deep below the ocean’s surface.

However, environmental groups warn that the surveys are an extremely loud and dangerous process.

“Seismic airguns create one of the loudest manmade sounds in the ocean, firing intense blasts of compressed air every 10 seconds, 24 hours a day, for weeks to months on end,” Dustin Cranor, Oceana‘s senior director of U.S. communications, told EcoWatch. “The noise from these blasts is so loud that it can be heard up to 2,500 miles from the source, which is approximately the distance from Washington, DC to Las Vegas.”

“These blasts are of special concern to marine life, including fish, turtles and whales, which depend on sound for communication and survival,” Cranor said. He noted that the government’s own estimates show that seismic airgun blasting in the Atlantic could injure as many as 138,000 marine mammals like dolphins and whales, while disturbing the vital activities of millions more.

Furthermore, Greenpeace said “pursuing this development stands at cross-purposes with the nation’s necessary and rapidly accelerating move away from fossil fuels, and with previous commitments to address global climate change.”

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society’s Capt. Paul Watson explained, “One of the major threats to the survival of cetaceans, is noise pollution. More seismic testing and military LFS testing will result in more strandings. This decision equates to a death sentence for thousands of whales and dolphins.”

Seismic data has not been gathered in the mid- and south-Atlantic regions, from northern Florida to Delaware, for at least 30 years.

The Interior Department said that the surveys are needed to update information about the Outer Continental Shelf that was gathered more than three decades ago, “when technology was not as advanced as today.”

The Associated Press reported that any new drilling activity is expected to be limited to the coasts of Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia.

Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke said that the surveys will help “a variety of federal and state partners better understand our nation’s offshore areas … and evaluate resources that belong to the American people.”

Industry groups applauded the department’s decision to review the permit applications. “There has been no documented scientific evidence of noise from these surveys adversely affecting marine animal populations or coastal communities,” Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association, said.

Trump’s executive order was aimed at rolling back President Obama’s permanent ban on new offshore oil and gas drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans.

“Renewed offshore energy production will reduce the cost of energy, create countless new jobs, and make America more secure and far more energy independent,” Trump said before signing the document last month.

But Greenpeace said that Atlantic drilling would threaten the region’s vibrant fishing and tourism industry, warning that “a spill equivalent to the BP Gulf oil disaster could coat beaches stretching from Savannah to Boston.”

Additionally, Cranor pointed out that more than 120 East Coast municipalities, 1,200 elected officials, and an alliance representing 35,000 businesses and 500,000 fishing families have publicly opposed offshore drilling and/or seismic airgun blasting.

“These individuals and groups understand that nearly 1.4 million jobs and more than $95 billion in gross domestic product are at risk if dangerous offshore drilling activities occur in the Atlantic Ocean,” Cranor explained.

Conservation groups have filed a lawsuit against President Trump, challenging his decision to reverse President Obama’s ban.

Trump expands offshore drilling with executive order

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President Trump signed an order Friday to kick off the process of undoing former President Obama’s restrictions on offshore oil and natural gas drilling.

In a White House signing ceremony joined by energy industry officials and lawmakers from coastal states, Trump pitched his executive order as a massive job and economy booster.

“We’re unleashing American energy and clearing the way for thousands and thousands of high-paying American energy jobs,” Trump said at the ceremony.

He said Obama had closed off 94 percent of the country’s outer continental shelf, which “deprives our country of potentially thousands and thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in wealth.”“Renewed offshore energy production will reduce the cost of energy, create countless new jobs and make America more secure and far more energy independent,” he said, calling the order “another historic step toward … a real future with greater prosperity and security for all Americans, which is what we want.”

The order came on Trump’s 99th day in office, during a week in which he signed numerous executive orders. He has now signed more executive orders in his first 100 days than any recent president.

The offshore drilling policy goes further toward fulfilling Trump’s promise to enable the production and use of more domestic energy, with an emphasis on fossil fuels. He promised on the campaign trail repeatedly to unleash the United States’ energy potential.

The order immediately repeals most of Obama’s ban on drilling in large parts of the Arctic Ocean, north of Alaska, which Obama intended to be indefinite.

It also asks Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to revise Obama’s plan for offshore drilling rights sales between 2017 and 2022. Zinke is asked specifically to consider drilling in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, which haven’t had new drilling rights sales in years.

Trump is also asking Zinke to consider repealing or changing “burdensome regulations that slow job creation,” including safety rules put in place after the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

“This executive order starts the process of opening offshore areas to job-creating energy exploration,” Trump said at the ceremony.

The oil industry and its allies cheered Trump’s order as a major shift in federal policy toward their priorities.

“We are pleased to see this administration prioritizing responsible U.S. energy development and recognizing the benefits it will bring to American consumers and businesses,” American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard said in a statement.

“Developing our abundant offshore energy resources is a critical part of a robust, forward-looking energy policy that will secure our nation’s energy future and strengthen the U.S. energy renaissance,” he said.

House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah) welcomed the policy as “a thorough review of the morass of bad policies developed and imposed by the prior administration.”

Environmentalists were joined by leaders, including governors of Democratic coastal states, in blasting the order.

“No matter how much money it spends or how many lobbyists it places inside the Trump administration, Big Oil can never nor will never drown out the voices of millions of Americans across the country who speak out against dangerous offshore drilling,” said Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club.

The governors of California, Oregon and Washington called the move shortsighted. The order doesn’t specifically call for Pacific drilling — where there have been no new leases in decades — but doesn’t rule it out.

“We still remember what happened in Santa Barbara in 1969, Port Angeles in 1985, Grays Harbor in 1988 and Coos Bay in 1999. We remember the oil soaked beaches and wildlife and the devastating economic impacts to local communities and the fishing industry,” California Gov. Jerry Brown, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, all Democrats, said in a joint statement.

“Now is not the time to turn back the clock. We cannot return to the days where the federal government put the interests of big oil above our communities and treasured coastline.”

Spike In Dolphin Deaths Directly Tied To Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, Researchers Say

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/20/deepwater-horizon-dolphin-deaths_n_7346250.html

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Posted: 05/20/2015 7:12 pm EDT Updated: 05/20/2015 7:59 pm EDT

GULF DOLPHIN

Dolphins swim near a boat carrying the Florida governor on a tour of oil skimming efforts in Pensacola Bay in Pensacola, Fla., Saturday, June 26, 2010. (AP Photo/Dave Martin) | ASSOCIATED PRESS
A dramatic increase in dolphin deaths in the Gulf of Mexico is directly linked to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, scientists concluded in a report published Wednesday.

Following the 2010 explosion on the drilling rig owned by British Petroleum (BP) and the subsequent spill of 4.9 million barrels (205.8 million gallons) of oil into the ocean, scientists have documented 1,281 dead and stranded cetaceans, primarily bottlenose dolphins, along the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico.

gulf dolphin

In this photo taken May 10, 2015, a dead dolphin washes ashore in the Gulf of Mexico on Grand Isle, Louisiana.

In 2011, Louisiana saw 163 dolphins stranded, while Mississippi had 111. By comparison, each of those states saw an average of 20 such incidents per year from 2002 through 2009, reported the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

One in three of the dolphins recovered from the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama suffered from otherwise rarely-seen adrenal lesions consistent with petroleum product exposure, according to a report from NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration. In Barataria Bay, Louisiana, one of the areas hit hardest by the oil spill, half of the dolphins showed similar lesions. In contrast, only 7 percent of stranded dolphins found outside of the Deepwater Horizon spill zone have had similar adrenal gland damage.

The adrenal gland produces and regulates a wide range of hormones, which, in turn, help manage basic bodily functions including metabolism and blood pressure.

gulf dolphin

A dolphin lies on dead on a beach on Horn Island, in the Gulf of Mexico, Tuesday, May 11, 2010.

“Animals with adrenal insufficiency are less able to cope with additional stressors in their everyday lives,” Stephanie Venn-Watson, the study’s lead author and a veterinary epidemiologist at the National Marine Mammal Foundation, explained, “and when those stressors occur, they are more likely to die.”

In addition to adrenal gland damage, researchers found 22 percent of dolphins suffered from serious bacterial pneumonia. In 70 percent of those animals, the lung disease was severe enough to have “either caused or contributed significantly to death,” the researchers noted.

Outside of the spill area, only 2 percent of dolphins had similar lung disease.

“The evidence to date indicates that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill caused the adrenal and lung lesions that contributed to the deaths of this unusual mortality event,” Venn-Watson told the New York Times. “We reached that conclusion based on the accumulation of our studies including this paper.”

BP responded to the report by questioning the link between dolphin deaths and the oil spill.

“This new paper fails to show that the illnesses observed in some dolphins were caused by exposure to Macondo oil,” Geoff Morell, BP’s senior vice president for U.S. communications and external affairs, told AFP.

“According to NOAA, the Gulf ‘unusual mortality event’ (UME) began in February 2010, months before the spill. … Even though the UME may have overlapped in some areas with the oil spill, correlation is not evidence of causation,” Morell added.

Business as Usual: Oil pipeline spills about 21K gallons off California coast

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The Associated Press

GOLETA, Calif. (AP) — A broken pipeline spilled 21,000 gallons of crude oil into the ocean before it was shut off Tuesday, creating a slick stretching about 4 miles along the central California coastline, the U.S. Coast Guard said.

Authorities responding to reports of a foul smell near Refugio State Beach around noon found a half-mile slick already formed in the ocean, Santa Barbara County Fire Capt. Dave Zaniboni said. They traced the oil to the onshore pipeline that spilled into a culvert running under the U.S. 101 freeway and into a storm drain that empties into the ocean.

The pipeline was shut off about three hours later but by then the slick stretched four miles and 50 yards into the water.

“Plains deeply regrets this release has occurred and is making every effort to limit its environmental impact,” the company said in a statement.

The Coast Guard, county emergency officials and state parks officials were cleaning up the spill. Boats from the nonprofit collective Clean Seas also were providing help but were having trouble because so much of the oil was so close to the shore, Coast Guard spokeswoman Jennifer Williams said. About 850 gallons of oil have been recovered from the water, Williams said.

The accident occurred on the same stretch of coastline as a 1969 spill that at the time was the largest ever in U.S. waters and is credited for giving rise to the American environmental movement. Several hundred thousand gallons spilled from a blowout on an oil platform and thousands of sea birds were killed along with many marine mammals.

More: http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/pipeline-bursts-spills-oil-off-california-coast/

DSC_8029

C’mon Nature, Show Us a Sign!

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Sometimes I find myself wishing that Mother Nature would hurry up and get serious about this global warming thing already.

No, not just because I secretly want to see the human scourge shed off the face of the Earth. (Not today, anyway.)

What I am talking about is the fact that the very things that should be ending to stave off catastrophic climate change—as well as the ongoing sixth mass extinction—are actually increasing.graph

For example, breeding. Okay, that’s a given, but let’s talk specifics.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, logging the rainforest is not coming to a close in acknowledgement of a warming planet needing all the carbon sequestering (not to mention oxygen—oh yeah, and shade) she can get. Indeed, everywhere I look there’s a fresh new clear-cut, while load after load of precious trees are hauled off in carbon-spewing log trucks to massive ships bound for China.

Now, if timber companies were increasing their “harvest” of evergreens to make way for more fast-growing, deciduous trees like alders or maples that would be one thing. But considering that they routinely use Agent Orange defoliant to kill the natural progression of plants on their “tree farms,” I don’t think they have saving the planet on their minds. Quite the opposite.

As long as there are global warming deniers out there, loggers can continue cutting down the forests like there’s no tomorrow. And anyway, who knows, maybe there won’t be one. I’d call it a self-fulfilling prophecy, but they’re certainly not prophets (profit-makers, maybe).

Another obvious example of an industry that should be calling it quits, but is instead expanding its ruinous ways: Big Oil. While climate scientists are warning us that it’s time to just STOP, Shell has plans to start drilling in the fragile Chukchi Sea (crucial feeding grounds for the grey whales, just south of the Arctic Ocean). Meanwhile, the President is allowing offshore drilling in the Atlantic for the first time.

Perhaps, like the logging companies, the oil barons are seeing the writing on the wall that their days are numbered, so they’re out to get it while they can—before the damned enviros slap them with enough restrictions or regulations to put them out of business for good.

So when I say I wish Nature would show us a sign, I don’t mean another massive hurricane or super typhoon, world record drought or raging inferno. Apparently those aren’t enough to shake some people up and out of their denial-induced torpor. I’m not sure what it’ll take. A total reversal of the jet stream? The icecaps melting and Florida sinking overnight? Spontaneous combustion of the White House?

Whatever it’s gonna be I hope it happens soon, before business as usual makes the whole mess worse than it already is.

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Tell the Feds NO Arctic Offshore Drilling

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From Ocean Conservancy.org:

Breaking: The U.S. government is beginning to make plans for future offshore oil and gas operations—and those plans could open Arctic waters to risky drilling.

This follows Shell Oil’s decision to abandon Arctic drilling this summer, after an accident-plagued 2012.

If a disaster like BP Deepwater Horizon happened in the Arctic, spill response would be even more challenging. The Arctic’s sea ice, freezing temperatures, gale force winds, and lack of visibility could make cleanup next to impossible.

The government’s public comment period ends on July 31, so we only have 10 days to respond. We need you to tell the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) to say no to risky Arctic drilling now.

Take a stand against oil and gas operations in the Arctic Ocean. Act now, and tell BOEM not to open additional Arctic waters to oil and gas drilling!

The Arctic Ocean and all those who depend on it are already under stress. The rapidly changing climate, including extreme deterioration of the summer sea ice, is putting Arctic marine animals at risk. Many people who live in coastal communities in the Arctic depend on a clean and healthy ocean to support their subsistence way of life. Offshore drilling for oil and gas would expose this already fragile ecosystem to significant noise, pollution and traffic.

Stand against risky oil and gas operations in the Arctic Ocean. Tell BOEM not to open additional Arctic waters to oil and gas drilling!

also see: http://www.yakimaherald.com/news/yhr/saturday/2358984-8/change-in-climate-sparking-ever-growing-wildfire-dangers

and: https://exposingthebiggame.wordpress.com/2014/07/24/obama-western-wildfires-have-a-lot-to-do-with-climate-change/