Joel Reynolds's Blog: Saving Wildlife and Wild Places

It's No Way to Save The Whales

2010-04-28T18:44:46Z

The Obama administration and the International Whaling Commission want to allow legal hunting again. It's misguided policy.

No one was surprised when conservation organizations such as the Natural Resources Defense Council challenged the anti-environmental policies of President George W. Bush. But it's a shock to many when we part company with the Obama administration.

It happens. And it's happening right now on the question of what to do about commercial whaling and, more specifically, whether to maintain the 25-year-old moratorium against the killing of whales for profit. Last week, the International Whaling Commission announced a proposed 10-year deal, spearheaded by the Obama administration, that would suspend the moratorium and allow whaling countries to kill whales legally for commercial purposes for the first time in a generation.

There's no disagreement between the NRDC and the administration that the moratorium is one of the singular environmental achievements of the 20th century. Before it was adopted, on average an estimated 38,000 whales were being killed each year. Since the moratorium, that number has dropped to about 1,240, and whale populations have begun, little by little, to rebound.

There's no disagreement that whales are among the most extraordinary creatures ever to inhabit the Earth. And there's no disagreement that we need to protect them, or that many of the large whale species covered by the proposed agreement -- humpback, fin, sperm, sei and Bryde's whales -- are depleted or near extinction.

The problem is how best to protect them.

The Obama administration argues that the whaling moratorium should be suspended because it has loopholes that are being illegally exploited by Japanese, Norwegian and Icelandic whalers. They believe that after 25 years of conflict within the International Whaling Commission, commercial whaling should be legalized in the hope that, by bringing the killing out into the open through agreed-upon quotas, a consensus eventually will emerge in support of a phase-out of whaling altogether.

Its intentions are good. But the strategy is dead wrong.

First, the proposed deal nowhere requires a phase-out of whaling. Not in 10 years. Not ever.

Second, legalizing whaling in order to eliminate it makes as little sense as allowing criminal activity in order to eliminate crime. By adopting the moratorium on commercial whaling, the world agreed that whaling, except for purposes of scientific research and subsistence, should not be allowed. Period. By suspending that global norm, the U.S. and the whaling commission will be ceding the legal and even the moral high ground to the very countries that, for decades, have been doing their best to circumvent it. Rather than a step forward in the fight against commercial whaling, this is a monumental step backward.

Third, the hope that reaching an agreement with the whalers will, in some undefined way, appeal to their better nature, eventually strengthen their interest in conservation and lead them at some future point to abandon whaling is, at best, wishful thinking. It is belied by the history of the whaling commission, where the whaling countries, even in the wake of the international agreement not to kill whales for commercial purposes a generation ago, have sought relentlessly to evade or end it. Japan exploits the exception for scientific research; Iceland and Norway assert their right to take exception to -- and therefore ignore -- the moratorium.

The Obama administration's fundamental premise -- that the proposed agreement will save thousands of whales over the next decade -- doesn't withstand scrutiny. The agreement suggests quota numbers, but no actual numbers have been agreed to among the nations of the whaling commission -- or even among the smaller group of nations that have, for the last three years, been negotiating the proposed agreement behind closed doors. The actual number of whales allowed to be killed if the agreement is adopted is, at this point, anybody's guess.

But even were that not the case, the situation that led the Obama administration to pursue this agreement in the first place would be unaffected by it. The exception for scientific whaling exploited by Japan will not be rescinded, nor will the exceptions claimed by Norway and Iceland be nullified. The agreement is fundamentally premised on an expectation that the countries signing the agreement will abide by it, notwithstanding their continuing right under the broader whaling convention to kill whales for research or pursuant to their existing exception. Thus, the fundamental problem of loopholes remains.

Finally, even if some might consider limited "sustainable whaling," it should adhere to science-based management principles. However, the quotas under negotiation now are not a product of the whaling commission's scientific committee. The negotiating process has been political, based on what the whaling countries are willing to accept rather than being governed by a scientific process to develop catch quotas consistent with the recovery of whale stocks.

Reasonable minds often can and do differ, even among friends. But the whaling commission's proposal for the next decade is a terrible idea. It would do more to protect the whaling industry than to protect whales, and it would be a tragic step backward to an era when the most magnificent animals on Earth could legally be slaughtered for profit.

President Obama, we strongly urge you to reject the deal on commercial whaling. Your administration is making great strides in developing a sound national policy for the protection of our oceans. Don't let the return of legalized whaling become your legacy.

Note: This op-ed was originally published today in the Los Angeles Times.

An Earth Day Message to Anglo American’s CEO Cynthia Carroll

2010-04-21T21:04:23Z

Last year, a delegation from the Bristol Bay region traveled to London to attend the Anglo American shareholder meeting and meet with you and your staff. They explained that the proposed project would threaten the way of life for local communities, commercial fishermen, Yupik Eskimos and other native people, and they communicated the intense opposition within the region that would be affected by the proposed mine, with the latest polls showing opposition around Bristol Bay in excess of 80 percent. Your response, we understand, was to assure them that the project would not proceed without the support of the people of the region.

On behalf of its 1.3 million members and activists, NRDC strongly endorses the position expressed by the delegation from Bristol Bay. Pebble Mine is a project that poses an unacceptable risk to people, to communities, to species, and to the extraordinary region that they share – a region that is home to one of the most productive, sustainable wild salmon fisheries anywhere in the world.

The pristine watershed that feeds Bristol Bay is the wrong location for large-scale mining, and it is insupportable to contend, as the Pebble Partnership apparently believes, that any amount of study or engineering can eliminate the unacceptable risk posed by the Pebble Mine project, given its immense scale, the inherently toxic nature of the mineral extraction process, and the complex and inter-connected hydrology of the area.

Within the last month, almost 100,000 people have registered their support for the overwhelming local opposition to the Pebble Mine, and those petitions will be delivered to you on Earth Day when you meet with your shareholders.

Consistent with the opposition expressed by the people who live there, we urge you to abandon the Pebble Mine project now.

The whole world is watching.

Please take a moment to sign our petition opposing Pebble Mine.

Zale Says No To Pebble

2010-04-15T23:53:59Z

When Zale Corp., the nation’s second largest retail jeweler, announced this week that it would boycott minerals produced at the proposed Pebble Mine, the reaction of Pebble Partnership CEO John Shively was telling: “Big deal,” he said, meaning, of course, that it was no such thing.

Actually, it is a big deal.

Zale is a major player in the global jewelry industry – a sector not generally known for biting the hand that feeds it – that is, mining companies. But in the case of Pebble, Zale is just the latest in a growing list of jewelers – now more than 30 companies, including Tiffany’s – who have decided Pebble is the kind of mining proposal that gives responsible mining a bad name. Because the mine is to be sited up the watershed that feeds Bristol Bay – near Lake Iliamna, the largest fresh water body in all of Alaska -- this mega-mine would endanger one of the most productive salmon fisheries in the world and everything that depends on it, from Native communities to commercial and recreational fisheries to wildlife species, both marine and terrestrial. It makes no sense to gamble with an existing renewable resource like Alaska’s incomparable salmon fishery – a resource that generates an estimated $400 million each year and thousands of jobs for Alaskans – in favor of a mining scheme devised by a consortium of foreign mining companies who would enrich themselves even if it means risking the livelihood of Bristol Bay residents.

Zale’s announcement is important, although Mr. Shively may not want to admit it, because of the signal it sends to potential investors, to elected officials, and to the public generally. There is a growing tide of broad-based opposition to the Pebble Mine, and it should be abandoned – now.

Please take a moment to sign our petition opposing Pebble Mine. NRDC and Native Alaskans will deliver the petition to the British mining giant Anglo American, one of the Pebble Partners, next week in London, when its shareholders will meet on Earth Day.

Pebble Mine: Foreign Mining Companies' Scheme Would Poison America's Paradise

2010-04-07T18:41:28Z

On Earth Day, April 22, 2010, of all days, the British mining giant Anglo American is holding its annual shareholder meeting in London. Anglo American and Northern Dynasty Minerals, its Canadian partner, are scheming to construct one of the world's largest copper and gold mines, the Pebble Mine, in the watershed above Alaska's pristine Bristol Bay.

This unspoiled region, surrounded by icy peaks, is made up of vast tundra, crisscrossed by crystal clear rivers, fed by pristine lakes, including Alaska's largest. Moose and caribou wander in fertile wetlands across a jigsaw array of national parks, wildlife refuges, and our country's largest state park. Grizzlies, wolverines, seals and whales, sea birds and bald eagles flourish there in numberless congregations drawn by the lure of tens of millions of thrashing salmon, charging upstream to spawn, feeding the most productive sockeye salmon fishery in the world. For thousands of years, local communities have relied on subsistence fishing and hunting.

Incredibly, the global mining conglomerate Anglo American and its Canadian partner Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. (including Rio Tinto and Mitsubishi Corporation) have already invested hundreds of millions of dollars in a plan that would transform this magical Eden into an industrial wasteland. They want to build one of the world's largest gold and copper mines in the heart of Bristol Bay's watershed. Picture a gaping pit two miles wide and 2,000 feet deep, and an underground mine almost a mile deep near the shores of Lake Iliamna, the source that, with the Nushagak River to the north, feeds the entire 40,000-square mile watershed and Bristol Bay itself.

At Bristol Bay's headwaters, the Pebble Mine will spew a witch's brew of toxic waste -- deadly acids from mineralized rock, contaminated leacheate from tailings piles, and the toxic residues from processing chemicals. The mining moguls will detonate thousands of tons of explosives to open the earth, build roads and trample thousands of acres of wilderness and wetland beneath giant vehicles. Project construction will permanently alter the region's natural river drainage system, including de-watering an estimated 60 miles of spawning habitat in the world's largest intact sockeye salmon streams. An 86-mile road will link the mine to a new deepwater industrial port in Cook Inlet, increasing ship traffic and port pollution and further pressuring the Inlet's dwindling population of critically endangered beluga whales. The mine would also threaten beluga whales in Bristol Bay, who depend on the salmon runs for survival. The mine may produce up to 10 billion tons of waste and lethally poisonous mine tailings stored in artificial ponds covering over 10 square miles, behind several of the tallest dams in the world - earthen structures that dwarf even China's concrete and steel Three Gorges Dam. The operation will require as much energy as Anchorage, Alaska's largest city, exacerbating global warming.

This apocalyptic spectacle in one of the world's most treasured ecosystems has mobilized a rare coalition of angry opponents in Alaska, including native communities, commercial and recreational fishermen, hunters, outdoor outfitters, environmentalists, and Alaska's tourism industry. Even prominent jewelers led by Tiffany & Co. aren't buying the conglomerate's claims that their project is safe: Tiffany's announced last year a "No Pebble Pledge" -- a campaign joined by over 20 jewelry companies, with annual sales in the billions.

And their skepticism is a safe bet given the track record of similar large-scale hard rock mines. A recent study found that 89% of such mines in the U.S. violated water-quality standards despite unequivocal permit commitments to comply with state and federal requirements.

The leader of this unusual alliance to protect Bristol Bay is Nunamta Aulukestai ("Caretakers of the Land" in Yup'ik), an association of native communities around Bristol Bay that have relied for millennia on subsistence fishing and hunting. Nunamta has partnered with Alaska's commercial and recreational fishermen to protect the cradle of what is arguably Alaska's most valuable renewable resource - the Fort Knox of salmon -- generating tens of thousands of jobs and over $400 million in revenue each year. Because copper is toxic to fish, even minute exposures risk impairing their navigational systems, destroying a salmon's ability to return to its spawning stream, and thereby jeopardizing all of the native communities around Bristol Bay and the region's wildlife that rely on annual salmon returns.

The Pebble Mine threatens southwest Alaska's natural resources, the economic foundation of communities throughout Bristol Bay, and our shared interest in the security of a food supply of national importance. Pebble is a toxic recipe for disaster, and it should be abandoned now. There are a lot of places in the world to mine copper and gold. But there is no compelling reason to allow a foreign consortium to destroy one of America's great national treasures and jeopardize the health and livelihood of American citizens.

Please take action now and sign NRDC's petition. Tell Anglo American that you won't tolerate the destruction of America's natural and cultural heritage in order to line its own pockets.

Note: This entry is co-authored by Robert Kennedy, Jr. and Jean-Michel Cousteau and appeared earlier on the Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-f-kennedy-jr/pebble-mine-foreign-minin_b_528324.html

Say No Now to Pebble Mine

2010-03-23T22:55:27Z

Pebble Limited Partnership CEO John Shively was on the stump last week asking people to withhold judgment, to wait and see whether the consortium of foreign mining corporations behind the massive Pebble Mine project proposed for the watershed above Bristol Bay in southwest Alaska can come up with a plan that won’t threaten the health, environment, and economic viability of Bristol Bay and the communities that depend on it.

Never mind that the 40,000 square mile Bristol Bay watershed feeds one of the most productive salmon fisheries in the world, generating over $400 million in revenue each year and tens of thousands of jobs.

Forget about the mega-mine scheme that the Pebble Partnership has already proposed, including an open pit two-miles wide and 2000 feet deep, and an underground mine up to 5000 feet deep, located at the region’s headwaters, next to Lake Iliamna, the source that, with the Nushagak River to the north, feeds the entire watershed and Bristol Bay itself.

Ignore the estimated 9 billion tons of mining waste containing toxic metals that the project would generate and the devastation that construction and operation of the mine would wreak on the interconnected hydrology of this seismically active region.

Disregard both the scientific consensus that copper, in even infinitesimal amounts, is toxic to salmon, interfering with their homing ability that is essential to their existence, and Pebble Partners’ prediction that Pebble could become one of the largest copper mines in the world.

Pay no attention to the overwhelming opposition of the communities that, for thousands of years, have depended on the health of the fisheries for their survival.

And, whatever you do, don’t think about the disastrous record of environmental failure of large-scale hard rock mines around the world, including mines operated by Anglo American, the very foreign conglomerate behind Pebble Mine itself.

John Shively’s invitation to “wait and see” should be declined.

Pebble Mine is a toxic disaster in the making, and it should be abandoned now. There are a lot of places in the world to mine copper and gold. But there is no compelling reason to allow a foreign consortium to destroy one of America’s great national treasures and jeopardize the health and livelihood of American citizens.

Please take action now and sign our petition. Tell Anglo American that you won't tolerate the destruction of America's natural and cultural heritage in order to line its own pockets.

A Reunion at Laguna San Ignacio

2010-03-05T22:36:00Z

I just returned from an extraordinary trip to an even more extraordinary place. Laguna San Ignacio, on the west coast of the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico is a World Heritage Site, a biosphere reserve, a whale sanctuary, a migratory bird sanctuary, and the last place on Earth where gray whales can breed and calve undisturbed by human intrusion. Each year, hundreds of gray whales swim thousands of miles from the Arctic to mate, give birth and nurse their young in the warm waters of this near-pristine lagoon. There aren’t many places in the world with so many layers of formal protection, and there is no better wildlife experience anywhere. (Check out the prose, poetry, photos and paintings from our members and friends which were inspired by their visits to the lagoon.)

My colleagues Jacob Scherr, Ani Youatt, Adrianna Quintero and I travelled to the lagoon last weekend to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the cancellation of the Mitsubishi saltworks project, a proposed joint venture with the Mexican government that was abandoned in March 2000 under intense pressure from Mexican and international environmentalists. Following is a video NRDC produced documenting the 10th anniversary.

For three days we met with our partners in the battle to protect Laguna San Ignacio and to share our memories of what became one of the largest environmental campaigns in history The campaign was initiated by Mexican poet and environmentalist Homero Aridjis, his wife Betty, and El Grupo de los Cien, and joined by NRDC, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (Jared Blumenfeld, formerly of IFAW and now EPA’s Administrator for Region 9, was with us at the lagoon), and many others, including former Mexican Deputy Foreign Minister Andres Rozental, Ambassador Alberto Szekely, Patricia and Laura Martinez of Pro Esteros, Serge Dedina of Wildcoast, Jean-Michel Cousteau of Ocean Futures Society, our colleague Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., renowned photographer Robert Glenn Ketchum, international law expert Mark Spalding, and film stars like Pierce Brosnan and Glenn Close. It was an amazing multi-year, multi-faceted, global campaign – one in which NRDC’s members and activists played a critical role. At one point, we had advocacy activities to save the lagoon underway in Mexico, the United States, Japan, Europe, and in the United Nations.

Our group included Ari Hershowitz, who played a key role for NRDC and the campaign in reaching out to the people living around the lagoon. Raul Lopez was there, along with other members of the local communities who showed real courage in standing up against the proposed saltworks. Their determination to protect the lagoon and their community made a critical difference in the fight.

But looking back was only a part of last week’s gathering, because the battle to protect the lagoon goes on. In 2005, the Laguna San Ignacio Conservation Alliance was formed with a goal of protecting permanently the lagoon and its surrounding lands. In the last five years, the Alliance has protected some 140,000 acres on the southern edge of the lagoon, and it has secured additional protection on 109,000 acres of federal land. It was great to have with us at the lagoon representatives of three groups that are playing a key role in our land preservation efforts: Miguel Angel Vargas of Pro Natura, Anne McEnany of the International Community Foundation and Peggy McNutt of the Resources Legacy Fund.

Over the next five years, we hope to conserve an additional 250,000 acres to prevent the return of the salt works project or any other major development project that could threaten the lagoon or the lands that surround it. As part of the reunion gathering last weekend, we convened a well-attended community symposium at the Kuyima camp to discuss recent and planned economic, conservation, and scientific activities around the lagoon. The following day, more than 80 children from communities around the lagoon piled into the small fishing boats called pangas for hours of whale-watching. For a number of the local kids, this was their first chance to get up close to the whales.

They say that “success has a thousand fathers… and mothers,” and credit for the victory at Laguna San Ignacio belongs to all of us who were fortunate to gather there last weekend and to many more who were not able to join us. The need to draw the line in the sand and save this special place was shared by hundreds of thousands worldwide. This victory demonstrated that it is possible for citizens to take successful action to protect and preserve nature. But the work never ends, and we look forward to more successes at Laguna San Ignacio.

Stepping Backward Is Not A "Way Forward" For Protecting Whales At The IWC

2010-02-22T19:43:43Z

The International Whaling Commission (IWC) today released a report by the Chair of a small subcommittee charged with negotiating a compromise on a “way forward” for the IWC. There is much discussion in the report about conservation, science, monitoring, governance, and yet-undetermined whale catch limits, and NRDC expects to respond in detail when a careful review has been done. While anyone familiar with the IWC can sympathize with the subcommittee’s goal, the report is, on first reading, a disappointment. The recommended way forward – if adopted by IWC member nations – would be a step backward toward legitimizing commercial whaling.

NRDC has long opposed commercial whaling. Whales are among the most magnificent and inspirational animals ever to inhabit the planet, and they play an invaluable role in maintaining the healthy ocean ecosystems essential to our survival. Sadly, as a result of commercial whaling in the 19th and early 20th centuries, many species of whales were pushed to the brink of extinction, prevented only by the efforts of generations of people around the world determined to “Save the Whales” before it was too late. One of the centennial moments of that movement was the adoption of an international moratorium on commercial whaling, which took effect a generation ago.

Although whaling nations such as Japan, Iceland and Norway have continued to hunt whales for profit since the moratorium – killing over 32,000 whales either under the guise of “scientific research” or reservations and objections to the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling – the whaling ban has been a pivotal step forward in the struggle both to save those species decimated by hunting and to recover whale populations throughout the world.

NRDC opposes any plan to weaken the moratorium. And we will urge the Obama Administration, at next week’s IWC Intersessional meetings in St. Petersburg, Florida, to continue this nation’s proud history of whale conservation by rejecting any proposal for the future of the IWC that would invite that result.

The Obama Administration’s commitment to our oceans and to the species that inhabit it is already well established. One of President Obama’s first appointments was that of Dr. Jane Lubchenco to head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the agency responsible for restoring our oceans. She promptly committed to developing a national ocean policy, long advocated by NRDC, to ensure the protection, maintenance, and restoration of our ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes ecosystems. More recently, NOAA has undertaken a review of the U.S. Navy’s safeguards in training with high intensity military sonar and announced a process for improving those safeguards. (Those powerful sonar systems are known to injure and kill deep-diving whales and to cause widespread disruption in numerous whale, dolphin, and porpoise species – as shown here.)

As the IWC decides, in the coming months, whether it exists to protect whales or to regulate their slaughter, we strongly urge the Administration to stand firm in defending the moratorium.

The Cove Exposes Senseless Dolphin Slaughter in Japan

2009-07-23T18:27:34Z

Many people know about NRDC's on-going battle to save whales and dolphins from ear-splitting military sonar. After watching an extraordinary and award-winning new movie, The Cove, hopefully many more will learn about the current battle to save thousands of dolphins from senseless slaughter in Japan.

Directed by Louie Psihoyos and produced by the Oceanic Preservation Society, The Cove chronicles former dolphin trainer Ric O'Barry's mission to stop the killing of over 2,000 dolphins every year in the Japanese coastal village of Taiji. Using hidden microphones and cameras, the film takes the audience on a daring journey into the heart of the once-secret Japanese dolphin hunt. The film tells the story not only of what goes on in this hidden cove but the lengths that O'Barry and his team had to go to expose it. It also uncovers the government's practice of unloading contaminated meat on unsuspecting Japanese consumers, including Japanese children, who were served mercury-ridden dolphin meat in mandatory school lunch programs.

With its Ocean's Eleven-style footage that you must absolutely see - and hear - to believe, The Cove could have depicted, but does not, a Dante's Inferno for dolphins. Instead, it places the Japanese fishery in a cultural and political context. Looming behind the film is the failure of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to stop the killing. Although the IWC banned whaling in 1986, Japan still kills almost 1,000 great whales each year under the guise of "scientific research" as well as an additional 23,000 dolphins and porpoises every year. Unfortunately, the IWC provides no protection for small marine mammals like the dolphins slaughtered at Taiji.

NRDC is working to change this. We've urged the Obama Administration to restore our global leadership in the fight to protect whales. We've also asked the Administration to stop the closed-door negotiations with Japan - originally initiated by the Bush Administration - that would legitimize the commercial killing of whales after a 20-year moratorium, and to engage in broad diplomatic efforts, outside of the IWC, to encourage Japan to end its killing of whales and dolphins for commercial purposes.

NRDC is also continuing our sonar work. We are currently fighting to improve mitigation measures for sonar testing and training in the Navy's training ranges. If left unchecked, the Navy's training would result in more than 2 million "takes" - injury or harassment to marine mammals - every year. NRDC has urged the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is currently conducting a comprehensive review of the Navy's sonar mitigation measures, to adopt measures that would protect marine mammals, such as protecting high-value habitat from sonar training.

Although environmental work sometimes has the feel of Mission Impossible, the audience leaves The Cove convinced of both the urgency and the possibility of change. If The Cove inspires you, now is the time to act. The Cove opens July 31 in New York City and Los Angeles and the following week in cities across the country. It's a compelling film everyone who feels a connection to marine mammals should see. To watch a trailer, read reviews or find out when the film will be at a theatre near you, visit The Cove website.

Watching Whales Watching Us in California

2009-07-13T21:53:40Z

In yesterday's New York Times Magazine ("Watching Whales Watch Us"), author Charles Siebert lays out a compelling case for what many people have long suspected: that great whales are conscious, social, interactive animals with complex social structures and cultures. The article is beautifully written and full not just of anecdotes of remarkable whale-human interactions but interviews with leading scientists who have documented that whales teach, learn, cooperate, grieve, and even use tools in their quest for food.

Using the 'friendly gray whales" at Laguna San Ignacio on the west coast of Baja California as the touchstone, Siebert covers a range of topics in making his case - from military sonar (calling NRDC's litigation to control it a "turning point" in the relationship between humans and whales) to commercial whaling to personal and historical anecdotes of interactions with these massive creatures in the wild. He suggests the remarkable proposition that these ancient creatures, once hunted virtually to extinction by humans, may somehow have learned now to forgive and even trust us, in spite of our centuries-old efforts to slaughter their ancestors for oil and other whale byproducts. Siebert argues that whale-human relations have long been characterized by a "stark dualism: manic swings between mythologizing and massacre; between sublime awe and assiduous annihilation, the testimonies of their slayers often permeated with a deep sense of both remorse and respect for the victims."

And nowhere is this more clearly the case than at Laguna San Ignacio.

At this extraordinary place - now a World Heritage Site, a biosphere reserve, and the last undisturbed breeding and calving lagoon of the California gray whale - this large baleen species that migrates each year along the west coast from Alaska was hunted by whalers like Charles Scammon, who would trap the calves in the shallow lagoon as a means of enticing the full-grown mothers within range for harpooning. After reaching near-extinction at levels below 1,000 whales, the species began to rebound when commercial whaling was outlawed in the mid to late 20th Century, with the eastern Pacific gray whale stock now reaching an estimated 18,000 gray whales at least - one of the most dramatic recoveries of any large whale species. It is in this lagoon today that whale-watchers come every winter to ride the protected waters to see and even touch 40-ton, 45-feet long wild animals and their babies in their natural habitat.

As but one example of the continuing, post-commercial whaling threats to these magnificent animals, it was in this lagoon that, in the 1990's, Mitsubishi Corporation and the government of Mexico proposed to build the world's largest industrial salt works - 116-square miles of industrial development, with 17 enormous diesel pumps sucking 6,000 gallons per second from the lagoon 24-hours a day; a million-ton stockpile of salt; a two-kilometer pier into the Bay of Whales where ocean-going tankers would dock to receive the salt for transport to Japan; and billions of gallons of toxic salt brine, stored in ponds adjacent to the lagoon and eventually dumped into coastal waters. Together with the largest environmental coalition ever formed in Mexico and the International Fund for Animal Welfare, NRDC mounted the largest public campaign in its history to challenge and, against tremendous odds, ultimately defeat the salt works project. Now, ten years after President Zedillo of Mexico announced that the project would be abandoned, NRDC and a coalition of international and Mexican non-profits have undertaken a conservation initiative to preserve in perpetuity one million acres around the lagoon through easements and land acquisition - to ensure that the whales will be protected from a return of the salt works project or any other major development.

This is a success story, but the international struggle to protect and restore whale populations around the globe will never end. Charles Siebert's article is a powerful statement of why that struggle, by NRDC and others, is essential.

Historic Tejon Ranch Conservation Agreement Celebrates One-Year Anniversary

2009-05-08T18:30:21Z

Most people have never seen a California condor. Last week, when I arrived at a meeting of the Tejon Ranch Conservancy at a cabin in the heart of the Tejon Ranch north of Los Angeles, a number of these majestic birds were sitting nearby in a tree, occasionally taking wing on the updraft that surrounded the cabin. It was an astonishing sight.

Today marks the one-year anniversary of the announcement of the historic Tejon Ranch Conservation and Land Use Agreement, one of the largest land conservation deals in California history. NRDC and four other prominent environmental groups negotiated the agreement with the landowner, Tejon Ranch Company, and its partners to provide for permanent protection of 240,000 acres -- over 90% -- of the largest contiguous, private landholding in California. Tejon Ranch is the critical biological connection between four important ecosystems -- the Sierra Nevada, the San Joaquin Valley, the Mojave Desert, and the mountains of southern and coastal California -- and this agreement protects hundreds of thousands of acres of those critical lands and guarantees public access for generations to come. As I said a year ago, this is perhaps the greatest victory for conservation in California that many of us will see in our lifetimes.

The agreement also created and funded the independent, non-profit Tejon Ranch Conservancy, which has taken many important steps forward in the last year. First, the Conservancy's Board -- on which I sit as one of the founding members -- hired a terrific executive director, Thomas Maloney, who spent the last eight years with The Nature Conservancy, most recently serving as interim ecoregional director for the West Coast region. Under the direction of Dr. Michael White of the Conservation Biology Institute, and in collaboration with the University of California at Santa Barbara's Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, the Conservancy has also kicked off its science program by initiating pilot research projects to determine species baselines on the Ranch. Public access programs have also begun to ensure that the public has increasing opportunities to use and enjoy the Ranch. Finally, the Conservancy has held extensive discussions with various state and federal agencies regarding the acquisition of lands identified under the agreement for that purpose and about the future use of the conserved lands, including a potential 50,000-acre state park and a potential University of California reserve for scientific research.

We've accomplished a lot in the last year, but much remains to be done. NRDC will continue working to implement this groundbreaking agreement to ensure that its conservation purpose is fully realized.

The Fate of a Toll Road Through San Onofre State Beach

2009-03-11T01:18:16Z

Today, the Los Angeles Times ran an op-ed I co-authored with Bobby Shriver on the fate of a disastrous toll road proposed by the Transportation Corridor Agencies in Southern California. I encourage you to discuss the article:

O.C.'s road test

Rejection of the Foothill South toll road is a chance for a new path.

By Bobby Shriver and Joel Reynolds

It was a bad idea that deserved to die: the six-lane Foothill South toll road through a popular Orange County/San Diego County state park. It violated the principle that parkland is permanently protected. The California State Park and Recreation Commission and the California Coastal Commission rejected the toll road through San Onofre State Beach -- no surprise there. But when the Bush administration also said no, the project's fate was all but sealed.

Now what?

There are real traffic problems in Orange County that the Foothill South toll road was meant to solve. But there are other ways to cure the congestion, alternatives that won't destroy our quality of life or our natural resources.

There is also a roadblock to those alternatives: the Orange County Transportation Corridor Agencies, which dreamed up Foothill South and hasn't yet publicly abandoned it.

Chartered by the state in 1986, the TCA exists to build roads and link freeways without, in theory, costing taxpayer dollars. It issues bonds, and its revenues come from toll roads. It is also virtually independent of oversight: It can propose, design, permit and operate the road projects it dreams up.

Not surprisingly, for decades the TCA has had only one response to Orange County's traffic congestion: Build big toll roads. In getting its three projects up and running -- the San Joaquin Hills, Eastern and Foothill North toll roads -- the TCA ignored the environmental consequences. Ecological reserves, the last remaining open space in the region and even lands set aside for protection as mitigation for other development -- all were targeted for toll-funded asphalt.

And yet the projected ridership never materialized. To cover costs, including millions spent on public relations and lobbying, the agency has raised tolls relentlessly, but to no avail. Its toll roads have been mired for years in financial difficulty. Just last year, the TCA applied for a $1.1-billion federal loan bailout from taxpayers to refinance its existing debt.

Meanwhile, traffic congestion has only increased.

With the demise of the toll road through San Onofre State Beach, we have an opportunity for change in Orange County.

What we need is a serious examination of alternatives beyond toll roads, especially options other than new roads through open space and parkland. Possibilities include rapid transit or carpool toll lanes, added to existing roadways, with congestion-sensitive pricing or similar strategies that take demand into consideration.

During the debates over the Foothill South, "Fix the 5 First" became a public rallying cry for widening the existing interstate. This alternative was never taken seriously by the TCA, which identified a 5 Freeway expansion alternative and then dismissed it because it said too many homes and businesses would have to be moved or destroyed. In fact, the TCA displacement estimates were grossly exaggerated, driven by its inexplicable use of sprawling, outdated interchange and ramp designs.

The truth is that the TCA will never decide to fix the 5, because the agency denies it has the legal or financial capacity for such a project. The TCA perceives its single purpose as building toll roads. Until that is changed, Orange County won't get open-minded traffic planning that looks forward instead of backward.

The Legislature chartered the TCA; now it must fix it. The TCA's unequivocal mandate must be addressing traffic congestion, not just building toll roads, and it must answer to a comprehensive state transportation agency, in consultation with affected regional agencies

We need mobility, and we need parkland. And we can have both if only we refuse to settle for less.

Running a toll road through San Onofre State Beach was a bad idea from a fundamentally flawed agency. Stopping it was a victory for the region. But what happens next will determine whether that victory has lasting significance.

Bobby Shriver is a member of the Santa Monica City Council and former chairman of the California State Park and Recreation Commission. Joel Reynolds is a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council and directs its urban program.

Fighting for the Lives of Marine Mammals in “The Cove”

2009-02-03T01:36:19Z

Every once in a while there is a movie so good it's astonishing, and this morning I saw one. It's called The Cove, and it has just been screened at the Sundance Film Festival to critical acclaim and standing ovations. The film, directed by Louie Psihoyos and produced by the Oceanic Preservation Society, chronicles former dolphin trainer Ric O'Barry's heroic campaign to stop the killing of 2,000 dolphins every year in the Japanese coastal village of Taiji. In the 1960s, O'Barry trained the animals that collectively became known as Flipper to TV viewers - an experience that he has spent decades trying to undo because of the role the television show played in creating the captive dolphin industry in the United States and around the world. He came to believe that dolphins should never be captive, and he has tirelessly campaigned to end the inhumane treatment of these undeniably intelligent, self-aware creatures.

The Cove is a riveting tale, told with skill, substance, and relentless drama. The place that gives rise to the film's name is a secretive cove in Taiji, Japan, and the film tells the story not only of what goes on in this hidden place but the lengths that O'Barry and his team had to go to expose it. The Cove is promoted as "an intelligent/action/adventure/Ocean's Eleven-like horror film wrapped around a tale of redemption and ultimate revenge - oh, and it's a documentary." It justly deserves, and was recently awarded, the Audience Award at Sundance.

This could have been, but is not, a punishing series of images of relentless cruelty. Instead, it places the Japanese fishery in a cultural, historical, and political context, tying it, for example, to the captive dolphin industry and to the failure of the International Whaling Commission, the only international forum devoted exclusively to the regulation of whaling but which, inexplicably, excludes any jurisdiction over, and therefore protection for, dolphins, porpoises, and other small whales. Claiming that the dolphins are "pests," depleting the world's fish stocks, the small group of fishermen who make their living in the cove do everything they can to prevent the outside world from learning what they're up to. Nothing seems to matter, including the health of their own children. Because dolphin meat is toxic, containing levels of mercury that vastly exceed safe levels, the fishermen have no where to go with the dolphin meat they produce but to serve it to children in mandatory school lunch programs or to market it to Japanese consumers as falsely labeled whale meat.

An international coalition has been working to stop the fishery that is the focus of The Cove and to protect the thousands of dolphins that are driven to their death there each year. SaveJapanDolphins.org has information on steps we all can take, including sending letters to the Japanese Embassy and to President Obama. This movie is a remarkable achievement, and everyone should see it. I hope they'll get the chance.

While Bush May No Longer Be President, His Legacy Endures

2009-01-23T21:15:50Z

Former President Bush may have left DC, but his legacy to degrade national environmental laws and allow the military to circumvent marine mammal protection laws continues. I was disappointed today to see the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) issue final rules on the Navy's use of sonar off the East Coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. The rules allow the Navy to expose millions of marine mammals to harm from naval training with high-intensity sonar. Today's action is a culmination of the Bush Administration's policy on sonar use and its lethal effects on whales and dolphins. Over the last few weeks, NMFS issued final rules covering sonar use in the Navy's Hawaii Range Complex, Southern California Range Complex, and now off the Atlantic Coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. The rule covers the use of sonar over millions of square nautical miles of ocean, authorizing over 10 million marine mammal "takes" incidental to Navy sonar training during the next five years. Each "take" is an instance of harm caused by high-intensity sonar that can range from disorientation, to hearing loss, stranding and death.

For years the Navy has pushed the NMFS to accept its flawed environmental analysis, underestimating the harm sonar can cause whales and dolphins and discounting the long-term effect of repeated sonar use on marine mammal populations. NMFS, under the prior administration, continually refused to accept its responsibility to proscribe rules for the least possible harm to marine mammals. For example, while allowing the Navy to train with sonar throughout millions of miles of ocean, NMFS failed to set aside even one square inch of important habitat. With this final rule, completed in the waning weeks of the Bush Administration, NMFS once again turns away from scientific evidence and sound policy.

Under the new administration, NRDC will urge NMFS to reopen these last-minute rules so that entire populations of whales and dolphins can be protected from this harmful technology. To do so, NRDC must also counter the one-sided information perpetrated to the media. For example, today's Associated Press story on NMFS' action fails to report that nearly two million "takes" of marine mammals per year - 10 million over the course of the rule - was approved by NMFS for the Atlantic coast and Gulf of Mexico final rule. The AP story unfortunately parrots Navy talking points on the adequacy of NMFS' protective requirements, neglecting to note that NMFS requires essentially nothing more from the Navy than what the Navy has traditionally been doing to protect marine mammals - measures that a court has already found "woefully inadequate."

Our work at NRDC is cut out for us. Not only will we urge NMFS to meet its obligations under the Marine Mammal Protection Act by reissuing these flawed rules - preventing the harm the previous administration leaves us with - but we will also remind people of the real harm sonar causes marine mammals, despite what they read in the paper.

Major Turning Point in Our Fight to Save Whales

2008-12-30T21:52:03Z

Last week, NRDC settled a significant case with the Navy. In 2005, we challenged mid-frequency active sonar training exercises that were being carried out around the world without the adequate environmental review required by federal law.

Despite mounting evidence that such sonar can kill and seriously injure marine mammals, the Navy refused to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act before using this dangerous technology.

Since our lawsuit was filed, and as a result of other cases that we have pursued since 2002, the Navy has now begun to prepare and issue Environmental Impact Statements ("EISs") for their major exercises and proposed sonar ranges, thereby addressing one of the major legal issues in the case.

In all, the five-part settlement that the Navy agreed to late last week includes:

A specific schedule for preparation of EISs for sonar exercises and ranges around the world.
Public disclosure of previously classified information on sonar use.
$14.75 million dollars in funding for new marine mammal research that was specifically identified by the environmental plaintiffs.
A 120-day process for negotiation with the Navy when future sonar proposals are finalized and disagreements arise.
$1.1 million dollars in attorneys' fees for time spent on this case and a 2006 sonar case in Hawaii.

The agreement does not require the Navy to institute any specific measures that it has utilized in the past to protect whales, because those are matters of continuing disagreement among the parties. But the agreement reflects both progress over the past five years by the Navy in its attention to environmental compliance requirements and the mutual interest of all parties in transparency, more thorough environmental review, and focused research.

And while it establishes a formal process for negotiation with the Navy that may avoid future litigation, it does not foreclose litigation as an option where necessary.

With this and other cases, NRDC is forcing the Navy to comply with our environmental laws, and we've reached a major turning point in our fight to protect our ocean's majestic mammals.

Supreme Court to Examine the Navy's Use of Sonar

2008-10-02T19:17:39Z

Next Wednesday, in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Supreme Court will hear argument in Winter v NRDC, our case challenging the Navy's illegal use of sonar off the southern California coast.

As I wrote about previously, NRDC challenged the Navy's refusal to comply with federal environmental laws when using mid-frequency active sonar during fourteen long-planned exercises in southern California. There is no question that sonar injures and kills whales and dolphins. The Navy admitted as much in its official "Environmental Assessment" of the exercises, estimating that the exercises would significantly disturb or injure an estimated 170,000 marine mammals, including causing permanent injury to more than 450 whales and temporary hearing impairment in at least 8,000 whales.

Nonetheless, in planning its exercises, the Navy refused to adopt common-sense measures to protect marine mammals from the effects of its dangerous sonar technology. The Navy's failures led both the district court and Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to conclude that the Navy had violated federal environmental laws. To remedy the Navy's violations, while still allowing the Navy to effectively train, the district court required the Navy to adopt additional safeguards protecting whales and other marine mammals.

The case took a dramatic turn when, following issuance of the injunction, the Navy turned to the White House in an unprecedented effort to avoid its obligations under federal law. The White House then issued two "waivers," purportedly excusing the Navy from complying with the district court's order. The Navy then sought to use the waivers to evade its responsibilities under federal law, but the district court, affirmed by the Ninth Circuit, rejected the Navy's claim, held that the waivers were unlawful, and maintained its injunction order. Unhappy with the lower courts' rulings in NRDC's favor, the Navy sought Supreme Court review, which was granted this summer.

Extensive briefing by the parties and a wide range of amici curiae was completed this week, and we are now preparing for next week's hearing. The Justices will be considering essentially two questions: (1) whether the White House can act as a court of errors, examining and rejecting the district court's finding that the Navy can effectively train under the court's order, and on that basis waive the requirements of federal law; and (2) whether, if the Navy is found to have violated the law, the district court was required to defer to the Navy's claims of military necessity, even in the face of conceded environmental harm and of the Navy's own contradictory evidence about its own past mitigation practices.

This case presents to the Supreme Court a classic confrontation between the power of the Executive Branch and the power of the Judicial Branch - a test of the Separation of Powers doctrine under our Constitution. It is a dispute whose importance extends far beyond the discipline of environmental law.

We have been working for over a decade to secure protections for marine mammals from the harsh and unnecessary harm associated with the Navy's use of high intensity sonar. This latest chapter, a trip to the U.S. Supreme Court, started as a straight-forward environmental case and evolved into a constitutional battle of the highest order. If the Supreme Court follows its precedent, we expect to prevail. But whatever the outcome, we will continue our efforts, both here in the United States and around the world, to protect these magnificent marine animals from the needless infliction of harm in the oceans.