Change is Made by Those Who Show Up. So I Bought a Ticket to D.C.
My name is Emily Barbo and in addition to my work in the Activist Lab at BUSPH, I am also an avid conservationist and advocate for environmental justice. There is a huge environmental issue being played out in our federal government right now that is important for my public health colleagues and fellow activists to know and care about.
On June 19, 2018, the Trump administration announced the repeal of the National Ocean Policy and issued a new executive order as a replacement. As a result, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) proposed offshore oil exploration and drilling program that opens over 90% of the Outer Continental Shelf to new drilling and puts our nation’s coastal communities, beaches, and marine ecosystems at risk.
The seismic tests used to determine if it’s worth drilling are deadly to smaller species like krill and plankton and are highly hazardous to larger species such as whales. The endangered North Atlantic right whales use vocalizations to communicate with their young. Their eyesight is very poor and in the murky Atlantic waters, this communication is critically important for mothers and calves to stay together. The noise pollution caused by seismic testing is known to interrupt these communications causing devastating consequences to these already at-risk species. The noise from the testing can travel more than 1,500 miles underwater, affecting animals along the entire eastern coast of the United States.
And it’s not just the right whales that are impacted. Seismic exploration has been shown to reduce singing in humpback whales, displace finback whales by hundreds of miles, and disrupt activities vital to foraging and reproduction over vast ocean areas. These surveys are loud enough to impact every aspect of the marine ecosystem.
Even if you put aside the impacts to the environment caused by the initial seismic testing (which you shouldn’t), the expansion of offshore oil drilling into the Atlantic would equally traumatize coastal communities and vital recreation and tourism industries. The proposed area for drilling includes the Gulf Stream flowing from Mexico right up to Canada, over to Europe and finally to the Norwegian coast. The scale of the contamination in the event of a spill would be catastrophic.
Can you imagine New England without the lobster industry? How about North Carolina with no clean beaches? No Maryland crabs? No spring break trips to Florida? And it wouldn’t take a massive spill. Each year about 880,000 gallons of oil is released into the ocean from North American offshore oil drilling platforms during normal operations. Recreation and tourism account for 83% of businesses and 71% of employment opportunities for coastal communities in the US. After major catastrophes like the Exxon Valdez and BP Deep Water Horizon, 25% of business never recovered even after cleanup efforts ended. What do you think happens to those jobs, to those people, to those families, when the tourists stop coming because they think the water is polluted, or worse because the water is polluted?
Spills are caused by a number of different reasons from negligence to natural disasters. When Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf of Mexico, it destroyed over 100 platforms and caused the release of 8 million gallons of oil. In 2004, Hurricane Ivan also damaged platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, triggering what is now known as the “Taylor spill” which has been leaking 300 to 700 barrels of oil every day off the coast of Louisiana for the past 14 years, and there is currently no end in sight.
Even under the best-case scenario, America’s offshore oil reserves in the Atlantic and Pacific would provide us an approximately 25 month-supply of oil at our current rate of consumption. New drilling will not significantly help long-term energy needs. Two years of oil is not worth risking the future health of our marine environments and coastal economies for decades to come.
Have I convinced you this can’t be allowed to happen to our environment? Our society? Our economy? I hope so. Here’s what you can do about it.
After BOEM’s Proposed Program is published by the federal government, a 90-day public comment period will commence. The most important thing to do is make a public comment clearly stating your reasons for opposing this Program. It can be as simple as “I am opposed to the BOEM’s Proposed Program for offshore drilling because of negative impacts on marine populations.” Take a stand with more than 300 municipalities and 2,000 local officials who have formally opposed offshore drilling.
What will I be doing about it?
Change is made by those who show up. So I bought a ticket to D.C. Thanks to the support of a Professional Development Scholarship offered by SPH, I’ll be participating in the annual Coastal Recreation Hill Day with the Surfrider Foundation, coastal business leaders, and other partners to meet with congressional offices to advocate for the protection of our coasts and oceans. I believe that the Proposed Program will cause negative downstream health outcomes to our most vulnerable populations and our natural environment. Stopping it is the upstream solution.