Hot Topics in Environmental Compliance

Transcription

1 Hot Topics in Environmental Compliance Dr. Robert Gisiner Director, Environmental Science/Biology IAGC Annual Members Meeting 17 February 2016

2 The Situation in a Nutshell 2

3 Land Habitats: exclusions, seasonal closures, restoration requirements. Less emphasis on sound The Current Situation Marine Emphasis on species Protected/endangered Marine mammals Fisheries Emphasis on Sound Exposure 3

4 Marine Compliance Common Mitigation & Monitoring: Pre-survey planning Geographic and seasonal restrictions Visual observations Soft-start or ramp-up Shut down or delay of activation of sources for animals within exclusion zone Requirements or restrictions during nighttime / low visibility 4

5 Consequences Direct and indirect risks to resource access Risk of operations being shut-down or delayed Risk of not being able to conduct operations in low visibility conditions (e.g. darkness, rain, fog) Increased survey expense Increased survey duration Cost of new greener technologies Increased safety risks Photo courtesy of Sercel, reprinted from Oilfield Technology, Dec

6 Increasing the number of species of concern Expanding protected areas on land and sea more onerous shut-down requirements Increasing focus on other effects; masking, stress Additional mitigation requirements (e.g. PAM, certification) Alternative sound source technologies (e.g. marine vibrators, passive seismic) Quieting technologies (e.g. bubble curtains) separation distances no duplicative surveys Sound source verification measurements Regulatory Trends use smallest source possible Caps on anthropogenic sound Funding of national data and research needs Its not all bad news! 6

7 Land Increasing the Number of Species of Concern Sage grouse, prairie chicken Marine Whales, dolphins remain most popular Sea turtles are all listed and have a strong constituency Commercial fish species Increased focus on marine invertebrates In the absence of ecosystem-based legal protections, iconic species may be chosen to protect an ecosystem of concern 7

8 ESA Critical Habitat Final Rules & Policy Rule: Designating Critical Habitat Previous critical habitat designations were made based primarily on where species existed at the time of listing. New rule calls for designation of unoccupied habitat that is deemed essential to the species conservation. Rule also calls for inclusion of unoccupied habitat that supports life-history needs and includes areas that support ephemeral or dynamic habitat conditions. Rule: Redefining Destruction or Adverse Modification Destruction or adverse modification meant direct or indirect alteration that diminished the area for both survival and recovery. New rule expands the definition to include alteration of habitat for the conservation of the species. Further the rule blocks activities that may preclude or delay development of habitat features essential to conservation of the species. Policy on Excluding Critical Habitat The ESA allows for certain exclusions from critical habitat designation The new policy clarifies how the agencies will deal with habitat covered by partnership agreements and conservation plans. Exclusion from critical habitat will be considered where safe harbor agreements and candidate conservation agreements with assurances exist. 8

9 ESA Critical Habitat Final Rules & Policy Summary The rule changes and new policy will likely lead to larger areas being designated as critical habitat. Expanded subjectivity by the agencies as to what constitutes adverse modification of critical habitat. IAGC, working with industry partners and legal counsel, is reviewing the final rules and policy to develop a strategy for dealing with impacts on our industry. While these are US endangered species policies and practices, similar trends can be expected worldwide. 9

10 Expanding ideas of critical habitat To include current and potential habitat To anticipate climate change Essential Fish Habitats Originally designed as a protection against fishing Marine Sanctuaries Increase of Excluded Areas Protections expanded to include sound Commercial fish species Increased focus on marine invertebrates 10

11 A Good News Story: Decreases to Shutdown Zones New research has reduced hearing injury thresholds Estimates of risk such as US MMPA Level A take greatly reduced. With few exceptions new injury ranges are << 500m. 500 meter monitoring ranges are retained for simplicity and risk reduction benefits Strength of the science US National Marine Fisheries put new criteria through two peer reviews and two public reviews US Navy has already adopted the new criteria Joint Industry Program independent expert panels concur Regulators may be slow to adopt due to political pressure NEGOTIATE!! 11

12 Increased Focus on Undemonstrated Effects Especially in the marine environment, the consequences of non-injurious effects are hard to determine This problem encourages researchers and advocacy groups to speculate about plausible but undemonstrated effects Our best option is to invoke models of biological significance such as the Population Consequences of Disturbance (PCOD) model. Behavior acute chronic Survival Disturbance Condition/Health Number of offspring Population chronic Offspring survival Physiology acute 12

13 Behavioral Effects of Seismic Sound Effects on land tend to be more confined because sound does not travel as far. Marine seismic generates a sound every ten seconds that may be audible for tens or even hundreds of miles. The sound may go on for weeks or months, but the source moves over considerable distances Behavioral responses observed thus far have been minor and short-lived, but both short and long term consequences are subjects of ongoing controversy Behavioral disruptions from many natural and manmade causes occur all the time: when does the disruption become biologically significant? 13

14 Unseen Effects: Stress There can be many reasons why animals do not react behaviorally to a sound. Avoidable or unavoidable sound can result in physiological stress As for behavioral response, stress is a normal and useful everyday response by animals to events in their environment The threshold for stress to have biological consequences is not well understood, even for humans It is not clear whether the state of the science would enable assessing stressful consequences of seismic sound Behavior, stress, masking all share the same currency : 14

15 Unseen Effects: Masking Sound from human activity can obscure or mask communication and echolocation Continuous sound, like ship noise, is a better masker than seismic pulses. However, simple equal energy models of masking have found favor with many regulators and environmental groups Simple ideas for regulation: Acoustic footprints and communication space Good News: The industry is sponsoring research to better characterize ACTUAL (vs modeled) risks of masking due to seismic sound 15

16 Additional On-board Mitigations Good News: due to industry investment PAM monitoring has increased regulator comfort with night operations. Remote PAM However, there is increasing awareness and concern about PSO and PAM mitigation not being 100% effective. Sense of variability in PSO, PAM quality leading to calls for training standards and certification The industry is sponsoring research to explore additional mitigation tools like infrared cameras, active sonar, unmanned vehicles These technologies, if found to have added benefit, also represent added cost and added demands on vessel ops. 16

17 Alternative Source Technologies Environmental concern has focused on loudness, high frequency content and impulse qualities of compressed air sources. Green sources are a potential business opportunity: Reduced high frequency content of pulses (e.g. Bolt E-source) Vibratory or oscillatory tuned frequency sources ( vibroseis ) Distributed popcorn sources, ambient, other. Source shielding Challenges: Benefits are as yet undemonstrated Alternatives may augment but not replace High cost of re-tooling 17

18 Good News: Some Dying Myths Marine seismic remains a poorly understood technology and commercial enterprise. Duplicative Surveys While regulators may try to limit the number of overlapping surveys (e.g. multiple 2D surveys) there is increasing understanding that different companies provide different proprietary work products that are not duplicative. Vessel Spacing Initially applied in the Chukchi Sea as a walrus corridor, BUT--Spreading multiple sources may actually increase durations of exposure, more important than additive loudness. Least Practicable Source Level Operators who are prepared to defend their array designs are more likely to prevail with regulators seeking a quieter source. AGAIN BE PREPARED TO NEGOTIATE! 18

19 Sound Source Verification Lateral propagation of seismic sound in the water column remains a complex and poorly understood phenomenon. Industry has sponsored data collection from single and full array sources, but data are not yet analyzed Industry has also helped expand and validate common models (e.g. NUCLEUS, Gundalf) The brand of source, array design and operating characteristics make each survey unique Without sufficient knowledge of variability, some regulators are considering requiring measurements from each array While ocean acoustic models are very sophisticated, environmental variability can account for deviations of 10 db or more from modeled propagation on any given day Some regulators are contemplating requiring periodic verification data collections as frequently as daily 19

20 Caps on Manmade Sound As the public and regulators become more aware of the expanding production of sound from human marine activities, emphasis is shifting from managing single types of sound (sonar, seismic, shipping) Concepts of acoustic ecology and sound zoning from urban and recreational land areas are being transferred to thinking about marine noise management, with or without legal basis.» EU Good Environmental Status guidelines from the marine environment include noise measurements and metrics (Descriptor 11)» NOAA NMFS maintains a Cetaceans and Sound website where marine acoustic data are archived and mapped. There are no laws for managing sound as a totality, but regulators are increasingly invoking cumulative effects arguments. 20

21 Research and Data Funding Attempts to regulate seismic have revealed shortfalls in the regulator s marine environmental data E.g., knowledge of abundance and distribution of non-commercial species is typically insufficient to assess potential risk from allowing activities The actual effects of noise (versus speculated effects) remain uncertain Regulators may attempt to fill those gaps by encouraging directed research by industry applicants: recent examples include Brazil and US Gulf of Mexico. Regulators may also seek to have the E&P industry fund their general needs E.g., stranding programs, acoustic data libraries, and monitoring data services. Challenges The desire to obtain permits by making concessions, Other relevant stakeholders (fisheries, shipping, renewable energy) may not be assessed equitably with E&P industry, Control of quality & independence of the work. 21

22 The bad news: In Summary New critical habitat protocols for protected species on land and sea Marine sound is a new environmental issue with unanticipated impacts on industry business models. The good news: Industry R&D is making a difference. A knowledgeable industry can negotiate better science-based regulation. 22

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24 Behavioral changes are highly variable and depend on: species Potential impacts behavioral changes: Marine Mammals context (feeding, mating, migrating, etc.) experience of animal (habituation or sensitization) sound characteristics (moving source, impulsive, etc.) It is important to address biologically significant effects as they relate to a population rather than behavioral responses of single individuals: If a marine mammal does react briefly to an underwater sound by changing its behavior or moving a small distance, the impacts of the change are unlikely to be significant to the individual, let alone the stock or the species as a whole (NRC 2005) 24

25 Potential impacts behavioral changes: Marine Mammals Examples of coexistence of marine mammals and E&P operations US Gulf of Mexico ~50 years of E&P activities sperm whale population stable West Coast Australia ~35 years of E&P activities humpback whale population increasing Chukchi Sea and Beaufort Sea 30 years of E&P activities bowhead whale population increasing 25