CRE Petitions BOEM and NMFS to Comply with Executive Orders 12866 and 13563 During Regulation of Oil and Gas in the Gulf of Mexico

On November 18, 2015, the Center for Regulatory Effectiveness filed with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the National Marine Fisheries Service comments on a Long Term Monitoring Plan for oil and gas seismic in the Gulf of Mexico. In the same document, CRE petitioned BOEM and NMFS to comply with Executive Orders 12866 and 13563 during the agencies’ consideration of an LTMP and GoM Take Rules under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

CRE’s comments and petition contained the following executive summary:

“The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (“BOEM”) and National Marine Fisheries Service (“NMFS”) should not proceed with the LTMP for the following reasons.

Just 4% of world’s Oceans lie within Marine Protected Areas: Study

An article by Karan Gosal in Perfect Science states that

A University of British Columbia study has suggested that despite global efforts to increase the area of the ocean under protection, just 4% of it is currently within marine protected areas (MPAs).

UBC Institute for Ocean and Fisheries researchers have discovered that main swaths of the ocean still need to be protected for meeting even the most basic global targets.

Representatives from around 200 countries met in Nagoya, Japan, in 2010, and adopted the Aichi Targets of United Nations in a bid to stem the speedy loss of biodiversity. The countries pledged to protect at least 10% of the ocean by 2020.