President George W. Bush”s administration is making its biggest effort to date to allow corporate development of the ocean for fish farms, oil drilling and wave energy.
While European governments are increasingly subsidizing energy development and insisting on local control of local resources, Bush”s emerging strategy mirrors his long-standing belief in market-driven solutions.
Bush on Monday lifted a presidential ban on oil drilling off American coastlines that was first signed by his father. Offshore oil drilling was banned by Congress in 1982 and by former president George H.W. Bush in 1990.
Bush is now pressuring Congress to lift its own ban. There, Democrats have been pushing oil companies to use the millions of acres of land they already lease before any discussion of being granted new ocean leasing blocks.
The Energy Information Administration says that even if both coasts were opened immediately, prices would not begin to drop as a result until 2030.
While the lifting of the presidential moratorium was a largely symbolic move that came as no surprise, a separate move to allow oil companies to turn their offshore rigs over to fish farms or alternative energy companies has created surprise and opposition locally.
A proposal published in the Congressional Register last week would expand the authority of the Minerals Management Service (MMS) in regulating alternative energy. It would also allow an oil company to leave its massive offshore rig behind if it can find an alternative use.
When oil rigs were installed off Santa Barbara and other areas of Southern California, the promise was made they would be removed when no longer useful.
“Instead of the government giving oil companies an easy way out of decommissioning oil rigs by allowing fish farming in our oceans, why doesn”t government spend some time and energy trying to help nurture, protect and sustain our existing commercial fisheries?” said Ben Platt, a local commercial fisherman and member of the Salmon Trollers Association.
“There are thousands of fishing families in our coastal communities who depend on commercial fishing for their livelihoods who would ultimately be harmed or put out of business by corporate ocean fish farming,” Platt said.
The administration”s proposed new rules cover a wide variety of ideas, from turning unused oil platforms into huge fish farms to harnessing alternative energy from wind, currents, waves and algae.
Michael Rubino, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration”s fish farm program, said the MMS plan has been misinterpreted in some accounts. He pointed out the plan would allow aquaculture as an alternate use, but any such plan would still need to go through all the same processes involving agencies ranging from the Environmental Protection Agency to the California Coastal Commission (if in state waters).
The president”s renewed push for fish farms compromises the integrity of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for many coast residents.
Some NOAA scientists concede to local fishermen that backing fish farms does produce serious questions about the agency. One top scientist told this reporter that NOAA has become “schizophrenic” over the past eight years due to a stronger push for market-based solutions from Washington and growing evidence from the ocean that stronger regulation is needed.
“To fishermen, this looks like one more step to remove stakeholders from the water and exploit the ocean for corporate profit, wave energy, no-fishing zones, fattening pens for tuna and oil rigs. Say good-bye to fresh local seafood!” said Jim Martin, West Coast director for the Recreational Fishermen”s Association.
Rubino says NOAA does have broad missions that are a “tall order” to integrate and accomplish. However, he feels the agency is up to it.
The Associated Press reported that some oil companies are experimenting with attaching fish farm pens to oil rigs. Fish farm workers could live on the platforms.
Wave and wind energy developers are also eyeing the platforms for their technologies.
“Oil companies long ago willingly entered into binding contractual agreements to eventually dismantle their offshore drilling rigs at the end of their useful life and to then restore the seafloor to as-near-original state as possible, given the mercury-laden mounds of dumped drilling mud that often surround these sites,” said Richard Charter, with Defenders of Wildlife.
“Now the Bush Administration wants to save the oil companies about one-half of these removal costs by enabling rig owners to either just discard the metal structure on the seabed — or to sell it for another use. This ruling is just another example of Big Oil getting what it wants from the Bush Administration before they leave office,” Charter said.
Fish farms are usually the domain of global corporations, especially those from Norway, Japan, China and Canada. The administration”s federally-driven process for corporate ocean development has increasingly alienated ocean users, many of whom are politically conservative.
“Our nation”s fishermen are proven successful at providing wild fish to the American public,” Platt said.
Fish farms in South America, operated by a Norwegian corporation, became an economic and environmental disaster when a virulent virus spread among the fish unexpectedly.
“There is no real need for fish farms in the ocean which could also spread disease to the indigenous populations and cause way more problems than the imagined need their proponents promise to meet,” Platt said. “And apparently, all because these companies don”t want to spend the money to safely get rid of the rigs, which they most assuredly agreed to in the first place.”
Rubino said there is 20 years” worth of science to support fish farms and said in the United States they are tightly regulated. He pointed to fish farms in Maine as a success story where they benefit the entire community and are subject to local and state regulation.
A Google search reveals much controversy over the Maine fish farms, including an escape of 100,000 fish and sea floor damage caused by those operations. Both ardent supporters and critics are quoted. Fish farm scientific reports don”t purport that such operations can benefit the oceans; they only differ in how much long term impact such operations will have on wild fish and the ocean ecosystem.
For Rubino, the issue is that most of the fish Americans eat is imported from fish farms. Adding new fish is beneficial but will need to come from farmed, not wild stocks, where a large increase wouldn”t be practical.
Interested people have until Sept. 9 to comment on the Minerals Management Service proposal to use oil rigs for alternative purposes.
Comments can be submitted alternative@mms.gov.
For further information contact Maureen Bornholdt, Program Manager, Offshore Alternative Energy Programs, at 703-787-1300 or maureen.bornholdt@ mms.gov.
