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Sound in the world oceans is an increasingly important conservation issue as human
impact throughout the oceans continues to grow without signs of abatement. Deep-water
background noise is reported to be doubling every decade. In the U.S. two major sources
of underwater sound are the seismic industry (regulated by the Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE)) and Naval sonar. Both of these agencies
are required to follow national environmental protocols, such as the National Environmental
Policy Act, (NEPA) in regard to their impacts on the environment. These two sound
sources produced (or regulated) by two different agencies generate similar impacts
to the marine environment, in particular protected marine mammals that rely on sound
for survival.
The assessment techniques used, and the transparency of the agencies involved is highly
in question for actions that produce similar impacts. This master’s project analyzes
the assessment techniques of BOEMRE and the U.S. Navy concerning underwater sound,
exposing the inadequacies and successes of each agency. The analysis was conducted
by reading and comparing the techniques used in Environmental Assessments (EA) and
Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) produced by both agencies from 2004 to the present.
A series of recommendations for both agencies was produced to address the need for
more streamlined and transparent analyses that will aid in more accurate and dynamic
impact determinations for such projects as the upcoming BOEMRE Programmatic EIS in
the Atlantic Planning Region.
I have also developed a GIS-based tool that aids in spatial analysis of propagating
sound within the marine environment to improve analysis of potential impacts. This
tool allows acoustic propagation models run in the computational program MATLAB® to
be imported and integrated in the GIS program ArcGIS ® through the Python scripting
language. The integration of this propagation data into GIS allows for better visualizations
of sound propagation in 360° around the source and from an aerial perspective. It
also allows for further geospatial analysis with other geospatial data such as habitat
suitability and species distribution, which can allow for more adaptive species impact
determinations and adaptive management for both sonar and seismic survey situations.
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