Whales and seismic

Let’s begin 2019 with two stipulations: First, whales are majestic, intelligent creatures that deserve to be studied and protected. Second, they should not be used as tools to suppress knowledge and information. This belittles and insults the first stipulation for purely political reasons.

Pure politics drove Maryland Atty. Gen. Brian E. Frosh (D) on Dec. 20 when he announced that he and eight other AGs from Mid-Atlantic coastal states were joining environmental and other organizations’ lawsuit to stop what would be the first oil and gas seismic surveys in decades on the Mid-Atlantic US Outer Continental Shelf.

Frosh said he was doing this to protect right whales and other species that some New England scientists say would be damaged from the vibrations. He compared this to having dynamite explode once each minute in a person’s living room.

He also said shooting oil and gas seismic now off Mid-Atlantic states probably would lead to development of resources there, which he contended would be even worse for not just undersea creatures but also local economies and businesses.

“Harry Truman, about 70 years ago, said that greedy men try to skim our resources. That’s what we’re looking at today,” Frosh said. “The plan to drill for oil off the Atlantic Coast is foolish. It puts at risk natural resources of incalculable value. It endangers the lives of marine mammals to no good end, and it does so at a time when, ironically, oil prices are at their lowest point in decades, and we’re facing an existential threat from global climate change.”

This argument ignores two important facts. First, seismic surveys have been shot in the Gulf of Mexico since 1937 with no evidence of impacts on marine life, according to the American Petroleum Institute. API and the International Association of Geophysical Contractors also have intervened in protest of the environmental groups’ lawsuit to block Mid-Atlantic OCS oil and gas seismic surveys.

Second, it’s necessary to specify that this legal action is about oil and gas because other scientific research seismic surveys have been shot in the area for the last 50 years without apparent problems. There were no reports of injury or even substantial disturbance from these other surveys on the Mid-Atlantic OCS in 2014 through 2018, IAGC says.

It’s not as if the National Marine Fisheries Service made a hasty decision when it issued incidental harassment authorizations to the five geophysical contractors on Nov. 30 after a more than 4-year delay. Besides, surveys can’t start until the companies get the necessary permits from the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. This lawsuit is simple political posturing, and it’s tiresome.