Offshore Oil & Gas

 

Beaches Closed As Maryland, Delaware Oil Spill Coats 65 Tons Of Debris. According to WRC-TV, “Some popular beaches in Delaware are closed after an oil spill left tar balls and oiled debris scattered along the waterfront from Bowers, Delaware to Ocean City, Maryland, about 65 miles south. The source of the spill is still unknown. Oil patties ‘as large as a manhole cover’ began washing ashore on Broadkill Beach in Delaware on Oct. 20, the U.S. Coast Guard said. By late Tuesday, crews had removed 65 tons of oily debris and sand from Delaware beaches, the Coast Guard said in an update Wednesday morning. ‘We’re not sure how long oily debris will continue to wash up with the tide,’ Shawn Garvin, Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control secretary, said in a a statement. Download our free NBC Washington app for iOS or Android to get the latest local news and weather. Bethany Beach, Dewey Beach and Lewes Beach were closed, the Coast Guard said Wednesday morning. Visitors were strongly advised to stay out of the water and avoid any debris deposited during high tide. Sixty-six birds were reported to have been covered in oil as of Monday, the Coast Guard said. Wildlife were being treated by the Tri-State Bird Rescue & Research of Newark.” [WRC-TV, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Bethany Beach Closes As Coast Guard Confirm Type Of Oil In Spill. According to WBOC-TV, “Bethany Beach is the latest beach to close as a result of the oil spill, which started at Broadkill Beach almost two weeks ago. Crews put netting out across the beach entrances to stop people from going out on the dunes. Bethany Mayor Rosemary Hardiman said it was a difficult decision, but needed to be done for the safety of the citizens and their animals. As Bethany Beach closes, Lewes Mayor Ted Baker said his beach is close to reopening. He said, ‘I will make an assessment probably tomorrow. But I think it’s very close, uh, the fact that, it’s very sad that it has gone so far down the coastline, uh, but that does, uh, should indicate that we are seeing less and less of an issue here.’ The Coast Guard has confirmed, it was a heavy fuel oil that was spilled. Mayor Baker said we need to know the source. ‘Everybody wants to know the source of the problem so it can be corrected. Obviously, this is a very costly endeavor to clean up,’ Baker said. But luckily, the Coast Guard says the money is not coming from the towns’ budgets. ‘The funds for our cleanup efforts are coming from the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund that was established by the Oil Pollution Act of 1990. The fund is not in anyway tied to taxpayer dollars. Instead, it is tied to industry, production, and also the fines and penalties that are levied against individuals that are found in violation of that act,’ said Incident Commander Fredrick Pugh.” [WBOC-TV, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Historic Hurricane Season Wreaked Havoc On Offshore Drillers. According to Beaumont Enterprise, “Offshore oil companies faced the most disruption from the 2020 hurricane season in over a decade, according to a new report. The 2020 Atlantic hurricane season, the second most active on record, forced offshore oil producers to curtail about 110,000 barrels per day. That’s the most since the 2008 hurricane season, which saw curtailments of nearly 140,000 barrels of oil a day. Before this year, hurricanes temporarily halted production on an average of about 20,000 barrels of oil per day, according to S&P Global Platts, an energy research firm. The report comes as Tropical Storm Zeta is barreling toward the U.S. Gulf Coast, expected to make landfall in Louisiana as a Category 1 or 2 hurricane on Wednesday afternoon. Offshore oil and gas operators have evacuated personnel from 154 platforms as of Tuesday, nearly a quarter of all the platforms in operation in the Gulf of Mexico, and shut in about half of the oil production from the Gulf, according to the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement. Zeta is the 27th named tropical storm this year, just shy of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season that saw 28 named storms and production curtailments of 220,000 oil barrels per day. Meteorologists ran out of traditional names for hurricanes this year, turning to the Greek alphabet.” [Beaumont Enterprise, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Marine Renewable Energy

 

Ørsted Looks To Soften Impact Of US Permitting Delays With Bigger Turbines. According to Greentech Media, “Leading offshore wind developer Ørsted says it expects delays to its U.S. portfolio, but said it is moving to seize a wave of opportunities on offer globally during the next 18 months. Asked by an analyst Wednesday which of the 25 to 30 gigawatts of offshore wind tenders scheduled between now and the end of 2021 that the Danish company will be pursuing, outgoing CEO Henrik Poulsen said: ‘All of them.’ Tenders are planned in the U.S., Japan, the U.K., Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, France and Poland. Taiwan may also hold an auction. Ørsted also offered an update on its U.S. projects, which have been caught up in federal permitting delays — a process the company now says is on pause. ‘Even assuming the permitting process starts moving within the first quarter of next year, it appears highly likely that Revolution Wind, Ocean Wind, Skipjack and Sunrise Wind will be delayed beyond the previously expected 2023 and 2024 construction years,’ Poulsen said.” [Greentech Media, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

Vestas Acquires Full Control Of Offshore Turbine Business. According to Greentech Media, “Global leading wind turbine manufacturer Vestas has taken full ownership of its offshore turbine JV, MHI Vestas. The company revealed Thursday that it has acquired Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ half of the offshore business. MHI will take a 2.5 percent stake in Vestas and a seat on the board in return. The all-stock deal is valued at around €709 million ($832 million). Vestas is also targeting market-leading status in offshore wind by 2025 and will launch a new technology platform ‘imminently’ in order to do so. ‘We won’t achieve market leadership with the current turbine,’ said Henrik Andersen, group president and CEO of Vestas, during an analyst call. Siemens Gamesa has become the market leader for offshore wind turbines. In May it revealed a new 14 MW turbine. GE’s Haliade-X platform, now scaled up to a 13-megawatt turbine, has provided it with fresh impetus in the offshore sector too.” [Greentech Media, 10/29/20 (=)]

 

Vineyard Wind Signs Transmission Deal For 800MW Project. According to reNEWS, “Vineyard Wind has agreed an interconnection agreement with transmission business ISO New England for its first 800MW project off the coast of Massachusetts. The deal allows the Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid Renewables JV to connect its generation into the New England electric power grid at the NSTAR 115kV switch station in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Vineyard Wind was selected to enter into PPA with Massachusetts electric distribution companies as part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Section 83C of the Green Communities Act offshore wind solicitation. The project will generate electricity for more than 400,000 homes and businesses across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and is expected to reduce carbon emissions by more than 1.6m tonnes per year. Vineyard Wind deputy chief executive Sy Oytan said: ‘We’re very pleased to reach this agreement, another important milestone in a project that will bring an entirely new industry to the US. ‘There is tremendous potential for job creation, not just during construction but also for operations and maintenance. These are good paying jobs that will be around for decades to come.’” [reNEWS, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Fisheries & Marine Life

 

Senators Introduce Fishermen's Fairness Act. According to Cranston Herald, “Last week Senators Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse introduced Senate Bill S. 4804, the Rhode Island Fishermen’s Fairness Act. The bill would amend the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA), the fishing law of this nation, to add Rhode Island to the list of seven states represented on the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council. The Council is one of eight regional bodies that regulate fishing with NOAA. The Senate bill would give Rhode Island two new voting seats on the council. Many of the fish caught off our coast are regulated by the Mid-Atlantic Council, yet Rhode Island has no representation on the Council. Senator Reed said, ‘The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council is a key decision making body that determines what happens off the coast of Rhode Island, but our state doesn’t have a seat on the Council.’ Senator Whitehouse, said, ‘As climate change heats up the oceans, fish that once lived in the warmer mid-Atlantic have migrated north to the waters off New England.’ Representatives Jim Langevin and David Cicilline of Rhode Island are expected to introduce a companion bill in the House of Representatives.” [Cranston Herald, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Sea Turtle Nesting Season Winding Down In Florida, Some Numbers Are Up And It's Unexpected. According to Phys.org, “Florida’s sea turtle nesting surveying comes to a close on Halloween and like everything else in 2020, the season was a bit weird. The number of green sea turtle nests on central and southern Brevard County, Florida beaches monitored by University of Central biologists were way up during a year they should have been down based on nearly 40 years of historical data. ‘Usually, green turtles alternate between high years and low years, but this year they defied expectations,’ says Chris Long, a doctoral candidate and research assistant with UCF’s Marine Turtle Research Group. ‘Green turtles had the fifth highest year on the Archie Carr Refuge that we’ve recorded since 1982. There is no evidence pointing to high nesting as a result of fewer people on the beaches or anything pandemic-related like that. It’s difficult to know why nesting differed from expectation.’ East-Central Florida’s coastline (from Brevard to Indian River County) is among the most important nesting areas in the world for loggerhead sea turtles, and it also hosts about one-third of all green turtle nests in the state. The region is at the northern end of a ‘hotspot’ for leatherbacks, which nest on the local beaches at a smaller scale as well. All sea turtles in the U.S. are protected under the Endangered Species Act.” [Phys.org, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Sea-Level Rise

 

'Ghost Forests' Are An Eerie Sign Of Sea-Level Rise. According to Yale Climate Connections, “Along the Atlantic coast, ghost forests provide haunting signs of sea-level rise. These stands of bleached and broken tree trunks are all that remain after salty water inundates a forest. Matt Kirwan is with the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. He says ghost forests are not a new phenomenon, but they’re moving inland faster as seas rise. ‘Eventually they’ll fall apart and become stumps surrounded by marshland,’ he says. ‘And so when you see a ghost forest now, you’re seeing where the marsh will be in the future.’ Marshes are valuable ecosystems, so in some ways, that’s positive. ‘Ghost forests are a surprising indicator of ecological resilience in coastal systems,’ Kirwan says. ‘They mark how marshes naturally migrate in response to sea-level rise.’ But that migration comes at a cost.” [Yale Climate Connections, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

Wanted: A U.S. Climate Migration Policy. According to Axios, “A new analysis of migration influenced by climate change calls for changes to U.S. policy that enable more targeted efforts to address the topic. The big picture: Climate change is already driving migration through flooding, drought and other effects, with more expected in the future, according to a brief from the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Why it matters: ‘[C]limate migrants have little recourse within existing international frameworks and systems, or domestic U.S. law, that otherwise govern migration and forced displacement,’ CSIS notes. That stems partly from the ‘difficulty of attributing climate change to human mobility as a singular — or even predominate — causal factor.’ What they’re saying: The report recommends ways that U.S. immigration policy could better deal with climate migrants and strengthen international efforts. One of the ideas is that the Congress should create a new version of the Temporary Protected Status program ‘specifically for people temporarily displaced by climate change-related disasters.’ Another idea is a ‘climate migrant resettlement program’ for people permanently displaced by ‘rising sea levels, human heat thresholds, and/or agricultural tipping points.’ The multilateral recommendations include a new Western Hemisphere regional compact on cross-border displacement, as a way to start ‘expanding the international legal architecture’ on the topic.” [Axios, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

How Seaside Communities North Of Boston Prepare For Climate Change. According to Northshore Magazine, “Climate change is reshaping the North Shore. At Crane Beach in Ipswich, erosion has swept away land equivalent to 84 football fields since the 1950s. In 2018, a storm destroyed the historic Magnolia Pier in Gloucester. The Great Marsh that embraces the upper edge of the coast is sinking in places from a legacy of ditching and flooding. ‘We are starting to witness unprecedented changes,’ says Tom O’Shea, program director for Coast & Natural Resources for the Trustees of Reservations, which protects 120 miles of shoreline in Massachusetts. In the face of these worrisome trends, the Trustees realized our region is at a pivotal moment as we confront the very real dangers climate change presents to our seaside communities. The group decided to investigate the true scope of the problem, focusing on the impacts of sea level rise and storm surge on beaches, salt marshes, developed areas, and wildlife habitats. The result of the first phase of this work, released in August, is the inaugural State of the Coast report, an assessment of climate change impacts on the 13 coastal towns from Salisbury to Swampscott. The goal is to create a body of knowledge that will highlight the depth of the problem, and galvanize action by local and state government while there is still a chance to make a real difference.” [Northshore Magazine, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

One Giant Leap For Climate. According to Politico, “If Joe Biden wins the Nov. 3 election, he’ll likely maintain the Space Force, a fledgling military service branch under the Trump administration, alongside many of Trump’s other space initiatives, POLITICO’s Jacqueline Feldscher reports. But Biden also plans to turn NASA’s attention closer to home in order to help the U.S. combat climate change. That would mean a greater role for NASA’s Earth science research, an area that has been squeezed by Trump, according to space leaders who are advising or supporting Biden’s campaign, and outside analysts. ‘If they talk about the Green New Deal, that would rely heavily on NASA to be a part of getting that implemented using technology in orbit,’ said retired Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden, who served as NASA administrator in the Obama administration. The space agency already uses satellites to study and understand the environmental changes that are causing more droughts, rising sea levels, more frequent deadly storms and natural disasters, while figuring out what human actions might reverse or minimize the damage. Those tools could be central to the government-wide effort that Biden has proposed to invest in clean energy and beef up infrastructure to withstand climate change. Refocusing NASA on climate change could allow Biden to frame space as integral to a number of his policy priorities, but that also means NASA, like all federal agencies, will have to grapple with where to prioritize its limited dollars. ‘Part of the problem specific to a Biden-Harris administration,’ said Peter Garretson, co-director of the American Foreign Council’s Space Policy Initiative, ‘is how can they sustain the momentum despite lots of tugs on resources for other things?’” [Politico, 10/29/20 (=)]

 

Op-Ed: Vote To Keep Our Heads Above Water. South Florida Is On Front Lines Of Sea-Level Rise . According to Miami Herald, “In less than one week, we, the people of the United States of America, are going to make a decision that will critically impact how we will spend the rest of our days on this planet, how future generations will live on this planet and how many more pandemics we will bring to it. Politicians focus on the here and now. On Election Day, let’s remind them that our lives continue beyond their terms of office. Unless they change our current course of action, skyrocketing carbon emissions will continue to heat the planet, melt polar caps and bring catastrophe to a peninsula defined by water: increased sea-level rise, more coastal flooding, saltwater intrusion into our freshwater aquifer, prolonged and record-breaking heat waves, extreme weather, including stronger, stalled and wetter hurricanes), ecosystem collapse, more pandemics and, eventually, a weakening of the Gulf Stream. Ancient ice-core samples show that for the last 800,000 years, carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations in the atmosphere have fluctuated between 200 parts and 300 parts per million (ppm). Temperature increases and decreases over time perfectly track these shifts. Scientists have found that it normally takes tens of thousands of years to make those 100 ppm shifts. In the past century alone, because of our addiction to fossil fuels, we have not only added 100 ppm to our atmosphere, but we also have pushed CO2 levels from 300 ppm to over 400 ppm. This hasn’t happened in more than 800,000 years.” [Miami Herald, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

Arctic Climate

 

First Drone Flies To North Pole On Climate Mission. According to E&E News, “Roberta Pirazzini set out an Arctic expedition to do something no one had ever tried before: fly a drone near the North Pole. Sensors on the drone would assess sunlight reflected from the ice. This measurement, known as surface albedo, is key to understanding how much solar radiation is absorbed by the Earth and how much is reflected back into the atmosphere. It’s one of the scientific puzzles that can help predict how fast sea ice will melt. But flying a drone over the planet’s northernmost reaches is no simple feat. Pirazzini and a colleague, Henna-Reetta Hannula, spent months learning to fly at the Finnish Meteorological Institute, where both are on staff as scientists. Technicians designed and built a sophisticated navigation system capable of handling extreme weather. The scientists and their drones then joined the largest Arctic expedition in history aboard the Polarstern, an icebreaker carrying dozens of researchers on a yearlong mission. The pair had also brought along a smaller practice drone that could fly inside their tiny cabin, the only chance they’d have to keep their skills sharp in the weeks of sailing before finally stepping onto the ice.” [E&E News, 10/29/20 (=)]

 

Ocean Health & Management

 

As Election Nears, Trump Makes A Final Push Against Climate Science. According to The New York Times, “The Trump administration has recently removed the chief scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the nation’s premier scientific agency, installed new political staff who have questioned accepted facts about climate change and imposed stricter controls on communications at the agency. The moves threaten to stifle a major source of objective United States government information about climate change that underpins federal rules on greenhouse gas emissions and offer an indication of the direction the agency will take if President Trump wins re-election. An early sign of the shift came last month, when Erik Noble, a former White House policy adviser who had just been appointed NOAA’s chief of staff, removed Craig McLean, the agency’s acting chief scientist. Mr. McLean had sent some of the new political appointees a message that asked them to acknowledge the agency’s scientific integrity policy, which prohibits manipulating research or presenting ideologically driven findings. The request prompted a sharp response from Dr. Noble. ‘Respectfully, by what authority are you sending this to me?’ he wrote, according to a person who received a copy of the exchange after it was circulated within NOAA. Mr. McLean answered that his role as acting chief scientist made him responsible for ensuring that the agency’s rules on scientific integrity were followed. The following morning, Dr. Noble responded. ‘You no longer serve as the acting chief scientist for NOAA,’ he informed Mr. McLean, adding that a new chief scientist had already been appointed. ‘Thank you for your service.’” [The New York Times, 10/27/20 (+)]

 

How Investors Are Coming Up With The Green To Save The Ocean Blue. According to The Washington Post, “Rob Weary led a seemingly glamorous life for almost a decade, traveling to remote island paradises known for picture-perfect beaches and technicolor corals. But Weary was no tourist. He was a dealmaker trying to convince small countries to protect their seas in a novel way — in partnership with big banks and international financial institutions. Four years ago, he struck a pioneering deal with the Seychelles, a splash of islands off the East African coast. At the time, the country was deep in debt and facing a gloomy future. Its economy depended on tourism and fishing, two industries facing decimation from climate change. As part of an investment team at the Nature Conservancy, the U.S.-based environmental group, Weary threw the Seychelles a lifeline: a chance to refinance more than $21 million of its debt. There were just two conditions. The government had to spend the savings on ocean conservation work such as coral restoration and trash cleanup, and it had to designate 30 percent of its waters as special zones where activities such as fishing and drilling are highly regulated or off limits.” [The Washington Post, 10/28/20 (+)]

 

Study Aims To Develop Global Seaweed CO2-Sequestration Credit Market. According to InsideEPA, “The ocean conservation organization Oceans 2050 has launched a first-time global study to develop scientific evidence and a methodology for monetizing the carbon sequestration benefits of seaweed farming that the group says will create large-scale carbon credits corporations can use to tackle their emissions. ‘We have launched a groundbreaking global study that will help restore abundance to the world’s ocean while advancing climate restoration through seaweed aquaculture,’ reads Oceans 2050’s website. The site quotes Oceans 2050 Project Lead Megan Reilly Cayten, who says, ‘Creating carbon credits for seaweed farming will allow corporations and others to invest in blue carbon credits at a much larger scale than is available today, and with very meaningful co-benefits in the restoration of the oceans and the livelihoods of all that depend on them.’ As described in an April article on physics.org, marine biologist Carlos Duarte -- Oceans 2050’s chief scientist -- and colleagues published a paper in the scientific journal Nature, ‘Rebuilding marine life,’ that concludes recovery rates seen in studies of ocean ecosystem restoration ‘suggest that substantial recovery of the abundance, structure and function of marine life could be achieved by 2050, if major pressures -- including climate change -- are mitigated.’” [InsideEPA, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

Japan PM Says Plan To Release Fukushima Water Coming Soon. According to Associated Press, “Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said Wednesday that his government is working on the final details of a plan to release massive amounts of radioactive water being stored at the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, a decision that has been delayed by protests. More than nine years after the disaster, the government still hasn’t made clear what it will do with the water at the plant, though a release into the ocean has been largely speculated on in recent years. ‘We cannot put off our decision forever without making a plan,’ Suga told a parliamentary session Wednesday, saying the plant is running out of storage space. ‘Based on discussions and expertise we’ve had, we will further deepen our discussion and responsibly make a decision at an appropriate time.’ A government panel in February issued a report recommending releasing the water into the ocean as the most realistic plan. The government and the plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., or TEPCO, say all radioactive materials but tritium can be safely removed, and that tritium is largely harmless. The plant now has more than 1.2 million tons of the water stored in 1,000 huge tanks that occupy a large amount of space at the plant. TEPCO says that it will run out of space in the summer of 2022 and that the tanks hamper the decommissioning process.” [Associated Press, 10/28/20 (=)]

 

 

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