07 Jan 2025
US President Joe Biden is set to ban new offshore oil and gas development across 625 million acres (250 million hectares) of U.S. coastal territory. The ban rules out the sale of drilling rights in stretches of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and the eastern Gulf of Mexico. The move is considered mostly symbolic, as […]
15 Oct 2024
Biden-Harris Administration announced that NOAA is designating 4,543 square miles of coastal and offshore waters along 116 miles of California’s central coast as America’s 17th national marine sanctuary. Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary will conserve the area’s diverse range of marine life and celebrate Indigenous peoples’ connections to the region. It is the third largest sanctuary in […]
27 Aug 2024
Conservation and animal protection groups have sued U.S. federal agencies in the U.S. Court of International Trade for failing to enforce import provisions of the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA). Ban seafood imports The provisions aim to protect marine mammals from bycatch in foreign fishing gear by holding countries exporting seafood to the U.S. to […]
30 Apr 2024
The US government has announced the recommendation of $123 million in funding across state and territorial coastal management programs and national estuarine research reserves. The funding will support habitat restoration and conservation, as part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda. These recommended funds will support: $59.8 million for state and territory coastal zone management programsfor 22 […]
09 Jan 2024
The United States has extended its claims on the sea floor by an area twice the size of California, securing rights to potentially resource-rich areas. The ‘Extended Continental Shelf’ covers about 1 million square kilometres (386,100 square miles), predominantly in the Arctic and Bering Sea, an area of increasing strategic importance where Canada and Russia […]
04 Apr 2023
The US government has released its new Ocean Climate Action Plan, a ‘roadmap to harness the power of the ocean to advance immediate, transformational steps to protect ocean health and address the climate crisis’. According to a White House fact sheet: “Acknowledging that there is no path to a healthy and livable climate without the ocean, the plan […]
21 Feb 2018
All the evidence from Davos, EA and the USA’s intelligence agencies points one way – climate change risks are rising. Intense bouts of flooding are set to become more frequent, the Environment Agency has warned The warning follows a pattern of severe flooding over the past 10 years linked to an increase in extreme weather […]