Op-ed | What happens after the airguns hit the water

Regarding Grand Strand elected official’s “wait and see” approach to offshore fossil fuel development: Despite Councilman Mark Lazarus’ opinion that scientific evidence of seismic survey harm to fish is “just science,” there is a preponderance of evidence that seismic surveys compromise marine mammal and invertebrate survival success as well.

But let’s just say that this doesn’t matter, and that the continuous low-level leaks and small chemical and drilling mud spills found around offshore oil operations don’t really constitute “a major oil spill,” and we go ahead and industrialize the ocean anyway.

What will happen is that the dynamically-positioned drilling platforms, seafloor-mounted high-pressure industrial separators and re-injection pumps, acoustical marine navigation aids, and a whole cadre acoustically controlled robotic equipment will turn the outer continental shelf oil fields into a roaring, screaming, screeching, and pinging factory floor.

While there is no evidence that adding this industrial noise to the ongoing seismic survey noise will damage fish (or other marine life), the evidence is only lacking because there have been no studies. Should we “wait and see,” we will find out eventually — the hard way.

Michael Stocker is director of Ocean Conservation Research, www.OCR.org, an author and bioacoustician who has been engaged with ocean noise research and policy issues since 1992.

This story was originally published April 24, 2015 at 8:00 AM with the headline "Op-ed | What happens after the airguns hit the water."