The Regulation of Seismic Exploration in the United States

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has published its Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for Gulf of Mexico OCS oil and gas Lease Sales 238, 246, and 248, which are tentatively scheduled to be held in August 2014, 2015, and 2016, respectively, in the WPA offshore the States of Texas and Louisiana. This Final Supplemental EIS updates the baseline conditions and potential environmental effects of oil and natural gas leasing, exploration, development, and production in the WPA . Click here to read this DSEIS.

 BOEM has a new draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for  Gulf of Mexico, Central Planning Area Lease Sales 235, 241, and 247. The Comment period on this DSEIS ends May 5, 2014.  Representative statements from this DSEIS include:

 “Marine Mammals: Routine events related to a CPA proposed action are not expected to have adverse effects on the size and productivity of any marine  mammal  species or population in the northern Gulf   of Mexico.”

 BOEM says in this DSEIS that most oil and gas noise is at frequencies too low to bother GOM marine mammals:

The U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has issued an Incidental Harassment Authorization to the National Science Foundation, Division of Polar Programs, and Antarctic Support Contract on behalf of five research institutions: Colgate University, Columbia University, Texas A&M Research Foundation, University of South Florida, and University of Texas at Austin.  This IHA is issued under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and it authorizes these institutions to take marine mammals, by Level B harassment only, incidental to conducting a low-energy marine geophysical (seismic) survey in the Dumont d’Urville Sea off the coast of East Antarctica, January to March 2014.

CRE’s comments on NOAA/NMFS’ draft Acoustic Guidance included the following Executive Summary:

“There is no physical harm from oil and gas seismic as currently and historically regulated by NOAA/NMFS and by other U.S. Government agencies. With regard to PTS and TTS, NOAA/NMFS have correctly explained:

‘Researchers have studied TTS in certain captive odontocetes and pinnipeds  exposed to strong sounds (reviewed in Southall et al., 2007). However, there has  been no specific documentation of TTS let alone permanent hearing damage, i.e.,permanent threshold shift (PTS), in free-ranging marine mammals exposed to  sequences of airgun pulses during realistic field conditions.’[1]

The United States National Marine Fisheries Service has issued an Incidental Harassment Authorization under the Marine Mammal Protection Act to Apache Alaska Corporation to take marine mammals, by harassment, incidental to a proposed 3D seismic survey in Cook Inlet, Alaska, between March 4, 2014, and December 31, 2014.  This IHA is effective March 4, 2014, through December 31, 2014. In its Federal Register notice of this IHA, NMFS responds to comments on the proposed IHA that criticize NMFS’ methods for determining MMPA Level Behavioral Takes.   In its response, NMFS states that

The United States National Marine Fisheries Service has issued an Incidental Harassment Authorization under the Marine Mammal Protection Act to Apache Alaska Corporation to take marine mammals, by harassment, incidental to a proposed 3D seismic survey in Cook Inlet, Alaska, between March 4, 2014, and December 31, 2014.  This IHA is effective March 4, 2014, through December 31, 2014. In its Federal Register notice of this IHA, NMFS responds to comments on the proposed IHA. In its responses, NMFS addresses its current approach to determining “small numbers” of marine mammal takes.  NMFS states that

NMFS received an application from Furie Operating Alaska LLC (Furie) for a Incidental Harassment Authorization (IHA) to take marine mammals, by harassment, incidental to a proposed 3D seismic survey in Cook Inlet, Alaska, between May 2014 and May 2015. Pursuant to the Marine Mammal Protection Act , NMFS requests comments on its proposal to issue an IHA to Furie to take, by Level B harassment only, six species of marine mammals during the specified activity.

The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has published its final Atlantic Geological and Geophysical Activities Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement. Click here for the relevant  BOEM website, which provides links for the multi-volume PEIS.