New research finds deep-sea mining noise pollution will stretch hundreds of miles 

by oceansadminPress ReleasesPosted on Comments are Disabled

Peer-reviewed study calls for more research to understand threats to this unique habitat 

WASHINGTON (July 7, 2022)— New research published today in the peer-reviewed journal Science examines the potential for underwater noise pollution from seabed mining operations, which could affect the understudied species that live in the deep sea—the largest habitat on Earth. 

The study by scientists from Oceans Initiative, the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) in Japan, Curtin University in Australia, and the University of Hawaii—and funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts—found that noise from one mine alone could travel approximately 500 kilometres (roughly 311 miles) in gentle weather conditions, with cumulative impacts likely in places where multiple mines operate. 

The deep sea is home to organisms found nowhere else on Earth—many of whom, given the absence of sunlight, likely use sound to navigate, communicate, find mating partners, locate food, and detect predators and other dangers. 

Seventeen contractors are exploring the possibility of mining in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ), an area spanning 4.5 million square kilometres (1.7 million square miles) between Hawaii and Mexico and a prime focus of deep-sea mining interest. If each of the contractors were to launch just one mine, an estimated 5.5 million square kilometres (2.1 million square miles)—an area larger than the European Union—would have elevated noise levels. Not only could this level of mining activity have untold impacts on noise-sensitive species, it could also undermine attempts to preserve areas with no mining impact—known as “preservation reference areas”—to use for scientific comparisons. 

“What surprised me most was how easy it would be for noise from just one or two mines to impact nearby areas that have been set aside as experimental controls,” said Rob Williams, co-founder of Oceans Initiative. “With so many unknowns, we need a careful comparison of these preservation reference areas to sites where mining is taking place in order to understand mining’s impacts. But noise will cross the boundaries between preservation zones and mining sites.” 

Added Craig R. Smith, a professor emeritus at the University of Hawaii, “Our modeling suggests that mining noise could impact areas far beyond the actual mining sites, including preservation reference zones, which are required under draft mining regulations to be unaffected by mining.” This finding, he said, “could require rethinking of environmental regulations, including the number of mining operations allowed within the CCZ.” 

Although mining companies are already testing smaller-scale prototypes of deep-sea mining systems, they have yet to share their data on underwater noise pollution. So the Science article had to use noise levels from better-studied industrial activities, such as oil and gas industry ships and coastal dredges, as placeholders. True noise levels from deep-sea mining may vary once the data is available—but, says Andrew Friedman, project director of Pew’s seabed mining project, they’re more likely to be higher than the proxy data than lower because actual seabed mining equipment is much larger and more powerful than the proxies. “These are probably conservative estimates.”  

Christine Erbe, a professor at Curtin University, said, “Estimating the noise of future equipment and installations is a challenge, but we don’t have to wait until the first mines are operational to discover the noise they make. By identifying the level of noise in the engineering design phase, we can better prepare for how this might impact marine life.” 

The island nation of Nauru invoked a United Nations rule two years ago that could force the International Seabed Authority, the intergovernmental organization that regulates all mineral activities in areas beyond national jurisdiction, to complete regulations that would enable large-scale mining by July 2023—or consider mining proposals without internationally agreed regulations in place. The move came despite concerns expressed by governments, corporations, and civil society organizations that the science and governance surrounding mining in the deep ocean remain inadequate. 

The Science study joins a growing body of research that finds it unlikely that adequate data to assess the ecological risks from mining noise will be collected before the July 2023 deadline. For this reason, a growing number of countries, experts, corporations, and environmental organizations are calling for a halt to any seabed mining, unless and until science and management can be put in place that ensure that mining will not cause harm to the marine environment. Pew’s Friedman said that the study “highlights how much remains unknown about mining’s potential impacts, not just on the deep ocean, but throughout the water column.” 

“The deep sea houses potentially millions of species that have yet to be identified, and processes there allow life on Earth to exist,” said Travis Washburn, a deep-sea ecologist at AIST. “While much work is still needed to determine the extent and magnitude of environmental impacts from deep-sea mining, with careful study and management we have a unique opportunity to understand and mitigate human impacts to the environment before they occur.” 

Rob Williams*, Christine Erbe*, Alec Duncan, Kimberly Nielsen, Travis Washburn, Craig Smith. 2022. Noise from deep-sea mining may span vast ocean areas. Science 377.6602: 157-158. *—These authors contributed equally to this work.

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A Year of Impact, Resilience and Joy

by Dr. Erin Ashe, Executive Director and ScientistConservation, Ecosystems, In the NewsPosted on Comments are Disabled
View 2021 Impact Report

This year, we were reminded that the changing planet will affect us all. As flood waters threatened his new home in British Columbia just months after nearly losing his home to fire in California, writer Malcolm Johnson remarked, “It’s also hard to believe that when we moved back to BC from California, not long after almost losing our home to an out-of-season wildfire, we thought we were moving away from climate disasters. But the truth is that there’s no away.”

There is no away for wildlife that have evolved over millennia to occupy particular habitats and ecological niches. In fact, it is precisely this variety of unique ecological roles that captivates us as scientists, inspires awe, and drives us to learn more. The things that make animals special and bring us into their world can be the very things that make them vulnerable.

Among the extraordinary animals we at Oceans Initiative study in order to protect: walrus and belugas that rely on icy habitats; river dolphins, nearly blind, using sound to swim through submerged forests in the Amazon River; and of course, killer whales evolving particular ways to make a living in the sea, with populations specializing on prey ranging from herring to salmon to stingrays and sharks.

For these animals, there is no away. They cannot occupy new habitats if we degrade or destroy the critical habitats they have occupied for millennia. After evolving cultural traditions (and anatomical adaptations) to hunt specific prey items, orcas cannot switch from eating salmon to jellyfish, just because we’ve destroyed their prey base.

But what about us? Human evolution is taking place over millions of years, but humans are rare in that our cultural and technological evolution can also take place in the blink of an eye. We can change our behavior, so the onus is on us to fix the environmental problems we have caused, collectively.

How do we make real change? How is change born? After such a rough few years, do we still have the capacity to change? I hope so, because countless lives depend on our ability to change. Change can feel overwhelming, because it is. When faced with complex challenges, it can be alluring to just keep “admiring the problem” as former President Obama said, and do nothing. We find there is power and joy in creating change together.

Human ingenuity and creativity allow us to take large problems, and break them down into smaller solutions quickly. But sometimes the enormity of what has been lost, and the changes we will see in an ever-warming climate, can seem too much to bear. So we need to build resilience to stay on the path together.

One way we do this is to look for joy in our work. We find joy in the beautiful animals we study and the magic of this planet. We see joy in the teams and partnerships we build and the inspiring people we meet. And, when we reflect on our unique place in this world, and see that our strengths and gifts are needed, we can take a small step and then another on a joyful journey toward healing the world.

Oceans Initiative is committed to this joyful journey to build resilience and make change in the world. We hope you will join us.

Building Resilience of Wildlife Populations

by Dr. Rob Williams, Chief ScientistConservation, Ecosystems, In the NewsPosted on Comments are Disabled

By Dr. Rob Williams, Chief Scientist

Have you ever read the fine print on your retirement plan? There’s probably a footnote somewhere to warn you that past performance of mutual funds or stocks do not guarantee similar results in the future. Investing in biodiversity conservation needs a similar caveat.

Sometimes, protecting endangered species comes down to common sense. When we stopped killing whales—after the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling—many populations of large baleen whales recovered quickly. Many populations of humpback or grey whales, for example, have been growing at 5-10% each year for decades. Some have done so well that they have been taken off endangered species lists in countries around the world.

But, there are exceptions to the rule. Hundreds of thousands of dolphins were killed accidentally in seine nets in tuna fisheries in the eastern tropical Pacific until public pressure forced industry to adopt dolphin-safe fishing practices. After the initial problem was solved, spotted and spinner dolphin populations have barely recovered.

The southern resident killer whale population was depleted by about 30% during live-capture fisheries for display in aquaria. Even though the live-captures stopped in 1977, the population has not recovered to historic levels. On the contrary, the population has declined from 98 to 73 individuals over the last two decades.

Our newest research on beluga in the St Lawrence Estuary showed that, even though beluga hunting stopped in the 1970s, the population is unlikely to recover to pre-exploitation levels in our lifetime, because the threats of contaminants, inadequate prey, noise, and climate change work together to hinder recovery.

What do these populations teach us? Complacency leads to extinction. Decimating whale and dolphin populations is easier than recovering them. We see this in our own health. You can fall out of a tree and break your arm in an instant, but healing takes time. With whales, we cannot count on populations bouncing back from harm. Each population is unique. Some may need us to slow ships down to make less noise. Others may need us to reroute ships to avoid striking and killing coastal whales. Others may need us to invest in ropeless gear for lobster and crab traps. Each action, on its own, seems trivial. But collectively, we can build the natural resilience of the population to buffer the next threat—climate change.

In 2022, we need your help to build our organization’s resilience, as we build resilience of wildlife populations in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. As the effects of climate change become too obvious to ignore, there has never been a more urgent time to invest in our efforts to keep important ocean habitats clean, quiet, and full of life. Thank you for supporting our conservation mission.

Destroying and Restoring Critical Habitats of Endangered Killer Whales

by Dr. Rob Williams, Chief ScientistConservation, Ecosystems, Human Impacts, Killer Whale ConservationPosted on Comments are Disabled

Endangered species legislation in the U.S. and Canada aims to prevent extinction of species, in part by designating and protecting critical habitats essential to ensure survival and recovery. These strict laws prohibit adverse modification or destruction of critical habitat. The population dynamics of SRKWs are now driven largely by the cumulative effects of prey limitation, anthropogenic noise and disturbance, and toxic contaminants, which are all forms of habitat degradation.

It is difficult to define a single threshold beyond which permissible habitat degradation becomes unlawful destruction. In a recent paper in BioScience, with lawyers, scientists, and policy experts from Natural Resources Defense Council, Ecojustice, and the US Marine Mammal Commission, we present evidence suggesting that line may have already been crossed.

A Chance Encounter with Dolphins to Discovering my Purpose in Marine Science

by Stephanie ReissWomen in SciencePosted on One Comment

By Stephanie Reiss, Oceans Initiative Field Technician

A Chance Encounter with Dolphins

I was on vacation with my family in southern New Jersey staying in a beach house on the shores of the Atlantic ocean. Our back deck opened to the sea, overlooking the grassy dunes with the unmistakable fragrance of the salty ocean air and the sound of waves crashing on the cream-colored sand. My Nana was outside enjoying a sun-kissed afternoon when I heard her shout, “Dolphins! LOOK! There are dolphins!!” My eight-year-old heart suddenly jumped as if it were now at the edge of my throat, and uncontrollable excitement welled from the depths of my gut, leaving me near paralyzed. My head was light and dizzy, the inner voice was ringing,  “DOLPHINS. Real, live, dolphins?!”

A moment or two passed before I was able break through the emotion and rush out onto the deck. Sure enough, out in the distance was a pod of common bottlenose dolphins, bounding in and out of the waves. I stood and watched in silence for as long as I could, the last porpoising merely a blip of grey in the sea of blue. For the rest of our stay, each day around that same time, I would stand on the deck, keeping vigilant watch and waiting for them to swim by again. Finally, on the last day, they graced us once more, frolicking just past the breakers as if they were putting on a show and knew we were watching. To me, this was my greatest delight yet, and the highlight of our trip.

My Quest Continued — My Questions Began

After that day, I would search for evidence of whales in any place I could, usually the movies, on TV, or in pictures on the internet. I absorbed as much as I could about this unique, diverse group of animals and I quickly became entranced. I watched a special on killer whale pods and the importance of family and I was awestruck by their social behavior. Where were they? What were they doing? Who knew about them? When could I see one? …were all the questions I was now compelled to answer.

The first killer whales I had ever laid eyes on were Southern Resident Killer Whales K35, Sonata and his mother K16, Opus. I watched from a research boat with my Marine Birds and Mammals college class as K35’s large dorsal breached the surface, and the blows of both whales saturated the air a few kilometers in the distance. My vision blurred as I peered through my binoculars at the magnificent creatures before me, and we shared life-giving breaths. The sheer elation of the moment had become mixed with a heaviness and disquiet. The whales were surrounded by boats filled with onlookers. I had learned about these threatened animals in my classes at the University of Washington and I found myself suddenly lost in a whirl of worry. The knowledge of their quandary laid thick on my mind. Were they finding anything to eat? Were there too many boats around them? Was I contributing to their struggle? From that moment on, the animals of J, K, and L pod, and their plight, had become indelibly tethered in my heart.

Fast-forward to today and I can hardly believe myself to be a scientist, let alone one who makes a living from learning about, observing, and protecting whales. My first project with Oceans Initiative was the Southern Resident Killer Whale field project, my literal dream job. There were many long hours and days-on-end in the summer sun, early wake-up calls to scan the Salish Sea, and countless numbers of PB and Js for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but nonetheless, my heart was content with the purpose I had found and the challenging job felt easy.

My Journey Through Doubt to Perseverance

Reaching this dream, believing I was deserving of it, and allowing myself to accept success however, has been far from easy. There is a common phenomenon among early-career scientists, which leads to insecurity, called, “imposter syndrome.” Unfortunately, it is one to which I am all too familiar. No amount of passion, drive, university courses, or papers read could have prepared me for that.

I grew up in a large family of seven, with three brothers and a sister. My parents always encouraged my siblings and me to study hard and pursue our passions through higher education. So, I took this seriously, accepted my fate as a “nerd,” and focused on my grades and academic goal. I also came to realize early on that for a woman, the path to a successful career in science was riddled with obstacles. However, I had many things going for me. I came from a family where both of my parents had professional degrees and my identity, nationality, and race did not place me at any significant disadvantage. Still, the fact remained, careers in science present considerably more challenges to women than men. Knowing this, I became even more determined that nothing was going to stop me.

I continued to study hard, maintain a good GPA, and push myself to engage in scientific activities. I graduated from the University of Washington with a Bachelors of Science in Biology and minor in Marine Biology, but I still felt incomplete. Then, one day my phone started blowing up with a number of different text messages from friends all containing the same thing—a job listing for new whale researchers. The position with Oceans Initiative had only been posted a few days earlier. I hadn’t yet seen it, but apparently many of my friends had. They all thought the same thing: “This was Steph’s dream job!”

More than a Blip of Grey in the Sea

I applied for the role of field technician at Oceans Initiative, quickly learning that I was one in a pool of hundreds of qualified applicants. I felt like one of those Jersey shore dolphins, as if I was just a blip of grey in a sea of blue. I fought back the urge to accept failure and withdraw before I had even entered the race. I was encouraged by those around me, declaring “you are perfect for this”; “you are so worthy of it!”.

The day came when I received the job offer in an email, amid the COVID-19 pandemic when all else felt dreary and lost, and I crumbled to the floor. I FaceTimed my entire family and before the words could even leave my lips, tears began to stream down my face. They screamed, cheered, laughed, and professed their belief in me over and over again. I felt that maybe I really was worthy.

For the longest time, I kept hearing that other inner voice reinforcing imposter syndrome and threatening to reveal to the world that I would never really be good enough with the resulting emotions being overwhelming. To this day, I occasionally hear that voice. Nevertheless, I continue to embrace that inner passion that I felt as a child seeing dolphins for the first time. I have found incredible purpose and resolve in the scientific pursuit and the amazing work we are doing at Oceans Initiative to protect marine wildlife.

Trust your Purpose and Let It Carry You Forward

As an early-career scientist, following my passion and the emotions that fuel it has been the most important thing. When the going gets tough, you must turn inward and allow yourself to feel and reflect on those emotions and to draw on whatever is burning deep inside that drives you. Whether it is a love for whales, a fascination with molecular genetics, a desire to make a difference in the world, let it carry you forward. You may still hear those voices inside that tell you that you are not good enough, or not really a scientist yet, or there is just not a place for you in the world of science and research; you can trust your purpose, unleash your passion, smile and enjoy the journey.

The truth is—and ladies, minorities, disadvantaged individuals this is for you—you are worthy of success in science. You CAN achieve your version of success. You WILL make a difference in this world. We need more scientists like you, and yes, you are a real, tried and true, scientist.

Thank you to Dr. Erin Ashe and Dr. Rob Williams, to my Oceans Initiative teammates and collaborators, to our incredible network of partners, to my limitlessly supportive friends and family, and to a chance encounter with a pod of dolphins so many years ago.

“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.”

— Frankin D. Roosevelt