New Rules Endanger Whales and Dolphins and Fail to Satisfy Federal Law
Last-minute rules proposed by the Bush administration will expose millions of marine mammals to harm from naval training with high-intensity sonar unless amended by the Obama Administration. The rules, issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), address Navy sonar training in the Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, in waters off Southern California, and around Hawaii. Together, they authorise over 10 million marine mammal “takes” incidental to Navy sonar training during the next five years. Each “take” is an instance of harm caused by high intensity sonar that can range from disorientation, to hearing loss, stranding and death.
The scope of these three “midnight rules” is immense. According to data compiled in the rules, the Navy’s exercises will injure or harass marine mammals more than two million times each year – more than ten million times over the course of the five year permits. The rules also effectively authorise the Navy to expand its existing activities. Together they cover the lion’s share of training exercises and sonar testing taking place off the United States, affecting the entire eastern seaboard, the Gulf of Mexico, California, and Hawaii.
Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), NMFS must ensure that it has properly analysed “takes,” accounted for cumulative impacts, and imposed effective mitigation measures. The new sonar rules, which were promulgated by the Bush Administration, fail to satisfy these federal obligations. For example, they fail to give any special consideration to whale species with known vulnerability to acute injury and death from sonar exposure; they fail to bar or limit sonar training in areas of known biological significance, instead authorising its use throughout millions of square miles; they fail to assess cumulative impacts on marine mammals despite the millions of predicted marine mammal “takes”; and they fail to include practicable safeguards to reduce risk of harm, including even those the Navy has used before.
Following is a statement by Joel Reynolds, senior attorney and director of NRDC's marine mammal program:
“These new sonar rules were completed in the waning weeks of the Bush Administration to prevent review by the Obama Administration. Unless reopened by the new leadership at NOAA, the rules will illegally harm entire populations of whales and dolphins over millions of square miles of ocean and rich marine habitat - and they will do so for years to come. This is a case of needless environmental injury on a staggering geographic scale, and it cries out for transparent, good faith review by an administration in which good science unquestionably matters.”
