Tag Archives: Incidental Harassment Authorization
Whale Slaughter Sees 500,000 Americans Demand End to Offshore Wind Power Onslaught
Half-a-million Americans are furious at the offshore wind industry for killing the last members of endangered whale species in droves with absolute impunity, thanks to the government-backed licenses that allow them to (quite lawfully) kill an unlimited number of whales, porpoises and dolphins – aka the ‘Incidental Harassment Authorization’. Hundreds of thousands of civic-minded folk are justifiably incensed at the entirely unnecessary carnage – the inevitable byproduct of an utterly meaningless power source – heavily subsidised and entirely weather-dependent and, therefore, incapable of delivering power as and when we need it. >click to read< 11:45
Government Grants Wind Industry Licence to Kill Critically Endangered North Atlantic Right Whale
The collapse in Atlantic Right Whale numbers runs in parallel with the increase in the number of offshore wind turbines planted into their (once) natural environment: numbers declined from 480 to 340 whales between 2010 and 2022. But, rather than putting a halt to the imminent and complete destruction of a charismatic seaborne mammal, the US government has given the wind industry a license to kill; known in the trade as an ‘Incidental Harassment Authorization’. Where ‘harassment’ means doing whatever is necessary to construct and operate giant industrial wind turbines offshore, up to and including killing whales in the process, and doing so with complete impunity. To equate the wind industry with ‘environmentalism’ is a first-order error. But to grant them a state-sanctioned licence to destroy marine environments – along with the rare and endangered species that environment supports, is flat out criminal. >click to read< 14:56
Marine Mammal Protection Act: Incidental Harassment Authorization Regulatory “Takes” – Take a Close Look
An IHA is a legal and enforceable document presenting the terms and conditions with which a company must adhere in order to protect wildlife. In this case, the draft IHA was for Vineyard Wind, the wind energy company ready to start construction on an 800 MW offshore wind farm in the Atlantic, covering about 675 square kilometers, starting 14 miles from the coastline of Martha’s Vineyard.,,, An IHA is required by the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) because, obviously, a huge project like this has impacts and it’s likely that “take” of marine mammals will occur during construction. >click to read< 08:26
A thousand days later, why is NOAA still dithering on allowing seismic surveys?
It has been more than a thousand days since the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries accepted as “final and complete” the Incidental Harassment Authorization, or IHA, applications needed to take seismic surveys off the Atlantic Coast. Considering that the Marine Mammal Protection Act, or MMPA, requires agencies to issue decisions within 120 days after deeming IHA applications complete, this delay is a shocking policy failure. (This is an oil industry article, with a link to NMFS AA Chris Oliver’s testimony.) >click to read<15:50
