Oceans

Sales Launch Enhanced Revenue Sharing Program, Increased Royalty Rates; Sale 206 Sets Record for Highest Total in High Bids

March 19, 2008 -- NEW ORLEANS — Two federal sales of offshore oil and natural gas leases in the Eastern and Central Gulf of Mexico attracted more than $3.7 billion in high bids today, inaugurating enhanced revenue sharing with oil and gas producing Gulf states, instituting higher royalty rates and underscoring the region’s continuing importance as a vital source of domestic energy production for the nation.

The first sale, the Central Gulf of Mexico Sale 206, attracted a record-setting $3,677,688,245 in high bids. This sets the record in high bids in U.S. leasing history since area-wide leasing began in 1983.    » read more »

March 19, 2008 -- BERKELEY, CA — Most oceanographers have assumed that, in the areas of the world's oceans known as High Nutrient, Low Chlorophyll (HNLC) regions, the iron needed to fertilize infrequent plankton blooms comes almost entirely from wind-blown dust. Phoebe Lam and James Bishop of the Earth Sciences Division at the Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have now shown that in the North Pacific, at least, it just ain't so.    » read more »

Panel Upholds Court-Ordered Protections for Marine Mammals during Training with High Intensity Sonar off California; Navy May Seek Review by U.S. Supreme Court

LOS ANGELES (March 1, 2008) – A federal appeals court last night rejected the Bush administration’s unprecedented effort to exempt the U.S. Navy from federal environmental laws as it engages in high-intensity sonar training off southern California.    » read more »

Federal Government Needs to Follow States' Lead on Ocean Policy, Says NRDC

WASHINGTON (February 27, 2008) – The United States gets an overall grade of C for oceans restoration efforts in 2007, according to the Joint Ocean Commission Initiative (JOCI) in its report card issued today. The annual Ocean Policy Report Card is designed to measure how quickly and effectively government implements recommendations from two recent national commissions that were established to ensure the continued health and productivity of ocean resources.    » read more »

12/07/2007 -- Taking an additional action in response to the San Francisco Bay oil spill on November 7, California Governor Schwarzenegger today sent the following letter to Secretary for Resources Mike Chrisman directing the California Resources Agency to extend funding of the Physical Oceanographic Real Time System navigation system and to work with state and federal agencies to obtain funding to modernize and permanently operate the system.

December 7, 2007

The Honorable Mike Chrisman
Secretary of Resources
1416 Ninth Street
Suite 1311    » read more »

Bi-Partisan Bill Would Focus Research on Acidification Threatening Oceans, Marine Life

December 4, 2007 -- WASHINGTON, D.C. – Legislation by Senator Frank R. Lautenberg (D–NJ) to focus research on rising ocean acidity passed the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee today. Ocean acidification harms marine life and poses serious risks to the fishing industry.    » read more »

Help to Preserve Great Lakes History

November 1, 2007 -- WASHINGTON -- Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., today introduced legislation to significantly expand the boundaries of Michigan’s Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary, making it more than eight times its current size. The expansion would help to preserve the rich history of “Shipwreck Alley” for historians and divers, where dozens of ships perished in the waters of Lake Huron.    » read more »

October 31, 2007 -- Washington, DC – Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Joseph R. Biden, Jr. (D-DE) delivered the following remarks today at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee business meeting to consider the Convention on the Law of the Sea:

“Today the Committee on Foreign Relations will consider five treaties and three nominations.    » read more »

October 23, 2007 -- Salem - Oregon Governor Kulongoski and British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell today signed a “Memorandum of Understanding” to establish partnership between the two governments to work together for climate and ocean protections.

As part of the memorandum, Oregon and British Columbia agree that joint action is needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and that many of these actions can have significant economic and environmental benefits for British Columbia and Oregon.    » read more »

Bill Would Focus Research on Acidification, Which Threatens Marine Life and Fishing Industry; Sen. Boxer Co-Sponsors

October 17, 2007 -- (WASHINGTON, D.C.) – Legislation Senator Frank R. Lautenberg (D–NJ) crafted to focus research on rising ocean acidity was added as an amendment to the Commerce, Justice, Science Appropriations bill that passed yesterday. Ocean acidification harms marine life, threatens the jobs of coastal workers and fishermen and poses serious risks to the fishing industry. The measure was co-sponsored by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA).    » read more »

10/10/2007 -- California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger today signed a series of bills designed to protect ocean and environmental resources. The bills, listed below, will maintain and improve the quality of California’s marine environment, promote ocean and coastal research, further develop fisheries management plans and guard against the threat of aquatic invasive species.    » read more »

WASHINGTON, D.C.— Creating “national parks of the sea” may be the only effective way to reverse trends that have left 76 percent of world fish stocks fully- or over-exploited and marine biodiversity at severe risk, according to the new report, Oceans in Peril: Protecting Marine Biodiversity, released today by the Worldwatch Institute.    » read more »

U.S.-Indonesia agreement targets ocean climate science, observations

18 September 2007 -- Washington -- A second tsunami-detection system for the Indian Ocean will launch from Jakarta, Indonesia, September 19, part of the $1 billion U.S. recovery, restoration and technical contribution to the region after the 9.1-magnitude earthquake and tsunami that devastated the area in 2004.    » read more »

17 September 2007 -- In the 19th century, intensive hunting brought the gray whale close to extinction. Although whales in the western Pacific are still endangered, protection efforts in the eastern Pacific seemed, at first, to have brought the population there back to pre-whaling numbers.

But new genetic research shows gray whales may once have been much more abundant than they are today. The finding suggests the world's oceans may no longer be able to support such a large population.    » read more »

17 September 2007 -- Conservationists have started a campaign to urge the Australian government to formally protect the Coral Sea, one of the country's last tropical marine wildernesses. A coalition, led by the World Wildlife Fund, has declared it a 'predator diversity hotspot' for its abundant shark populations. The environmental groups are concerned the area could be damaged by a variety of man-made threats. Phil Mercer reports from Sydney.

Conservationists describe the Coral Sea as "a stunning blue-water highway, full of oceanic predators."    » read more »