Trump issues new National Ocean Policy

Maritime News
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I guess it is fair to say now that the offshore recovery is officially underway

Trump issues new National Ocean Policy

By Kirk Moore on June 21, 2018

A new National Ocean Policy adopted by the Trump administration stresses economic benefits from ocean industries, rescinding a 2010 Obama policy that focused on marine conservation.

The order President Trump signed June 19 rolls back regional planning bodies, envisioned in the Obama plan as advisory groups to help develop ocean zoning and avoid user conflicts.

Critics had derided the regional planning as a potential new bureaucracy. The National Ocean Policy Coalition, consisting of energy, industry, commercial and recreational fishing groups, and other interests applauded Trump’s latest undoing of an Obama initiative.

Overturning the 2010 policy “removes a significant cloud of uncertainty that has been hovering over a wide range of commercial and recreational interests that represent a broad cross-section of the American economy,” said NOPC managing director Jack Belcher, “threatening domestic jobs, economic activity, and recreational opportunities through new and unauthorized bureaucracies, mandates to federal agencies, and actions that could needlessly prohibit, limit, or delay access to public lands.”

Industry and energy are prominent in the Trump order, which states at the outset “ocean industries employ millions of Americans and support a strong national economy. Domestic energy production from Federal waters strengthens the Nation’s security and reduces reliance on imported energy.”

Among its imperatives, the Trump order specifies that government must “ensure that Federal regulations and management decisions do not prevent productive and sustainable use of ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes waters.”

Environmental groups fumed at the reversal.

“The repeal of the National Ocean Policy is another attack in the Trump administration’s all-out assault on the nation’s public lands and oceans for the sake of private exploitation and profit,” said Priscilla Brooks, director of ocean conservation at the New England-based Conservation Law Foundation. The Obama policy set the stage for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast Ocean plans, the first regional frameworks to come out of the planning process.

The Trump order still speaks to the need for using the best science and coordination among all levels of government to maintain ocean resources, as other administrations have recognized. Some results from the Obama years, such as detailed mapping of economic activity on the ocean, have served the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management as it prepares new offshore energy leases for oil, gas and wind power development.

The Mid-Atlantic planning effort is particularly valuable with the ramping up of plans by wind energy developers off the East Coast, says Tony MacDonald, director of the Urban Coast Institute at Monmouth University in New Jersey.

Writing in the institute’s online newsletter, MacDonald noted that neither Obama’s nor Trump’s orders changed existing laws protecting ocean resources, despite their different priorities.

“This shift in language should not be used to justify tipping the scales against the ‘environmental benefits’ cited in the order and actions necessary to protect and restore the marine environment, and to hold ocean users accountable to limit their impacts,” MacDonald wrote. “My experience working with various ocean stakeholders over the past 30 years ranging from ports to state managers to fishermen to nongovernmental organizations is that, despite their differences, they have a shared interest in stewardship of ocean resources.”

maybe now also this forum will cease being the new cooking channel and get back to matters maritime…

sauces at sea…who cares?

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10 posts were split to a new topic: Sauces at sea…who cares?

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Breath of fresh air!!! Yes repealing the Orwellian Coastal Maritime Spatial Planning (CMSP) nonsense and truly frightening Obama UN new word order Socialist policies I have some knowledge from a former life working in Washington DC. It was in essence the maritime version of AGENDA 21 if any of you out there know what that is. Caught several beltway types trying to weasel their way out of that comparison, they would run when they saw me … but I digress. Good riddance for CMSP, it was strongarming communities into participating and threatening their access to the coastal areas if they did not, scary, scary stuff.

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Between rescinding this week the Obama-era National Oceans Policy, which gave specific mention to Deepwater Horizon, as well as rolling back offshore drilling safety rules put in place as a direct result of DWH, it would seem President Trump is trying to erase the memory and is ignoring the lessons learned from the disaster.

How do you feel about that?

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Apprehensive.

Earl

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now all we need is for the price of crude to hold at over $75 for a year and the work will be back (not like before but it appears to already be on the way back so a year of over $75 should do the trick!)

as far as the majors cutting corners again and taking big risks, I can’t see any of them going back to the way BP was operating. How many billions on billions did DWH cost them? No, the operators will play it more cautious from now on but the idiotic redundant rules should go.

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Are you saying this because these policies and market will personally benefit you or do you just want things to go back to like they were in the old days?

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I have no love for Trump but the pain everyone has felt now after four years of downturn has been tremendous for myself and my fellow mariners. I believe the entire US maritime industry benefits when the offshore industry is healthy and I personally am ready to go back to work (including in the offshore if that ends up being where the best opportunities will be found). The surplus equipment business is too hit or miss and I miss getting a nice $$$ deposit into my bank account every couple of weeks.

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Damn little; BP came away essentially unscathed. Pay no attention to the big numbers tossed around by the politicians and look at how the payout is structured: 18.7 billion over 15 to 17 years with (about) 4.5 billion in tax writeoffs. Run the numbers an it comes out to under a billion a year. Chump change for an outfit the size of BP.

The spreadsheet jockeys who run the other majors know this, an aren’t deterred in the slightest. So $70-80 becomes the max risk point, high enough to tempt somebody to roll the dice on an ultradeep HPHT well but not high enough to give the necessary cushion for safety.

And I’m not the only one who’s apprehensive.

Earl

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Serious question, not trying to stir up anything.

When you say this, do you mean the OSV world??

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There is overreaching buerocracy and their is common sense in the world of regulations. This one was more common sense or at least forced common sense which in my opinion is the only way to manipulate large multinational oil companies to do the right thing. Or as one other member noted, maybe the market will determined the level of risk these companies choose to take on offshore after BP’s multi billion dollar exposure with DWH.

Either way it’s just another Jenga block from Obama’s legacy which trump has chosen this week to pluck out of the stack. Shouldn’t congress be consulted on making common sense drilling the law of the land?

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And here I thought you’d walk right into that one

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of course, although I am not inclined to work for any of the Bayoo boys (nor would they likely have me). if it gets back to the world of 2012 then will be plenty of high paying jobs for all who have the experience and certificates (although mine are in need of renewal soon)

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why? I still remain a huge proponent of a strong and vibrant industry and with the dozens of dollars I make being a junk trader why not want to get back to $200k/yr? Sure, I hate most of the offshore players but there is a place for anyone with the right background

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let me also say “thank you Jesus” that this thread is back on the tracks. finally the forum beginning to resemble its former glory…real discussions about topics important to us all!

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You mean you.

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My sources tell me little has changed since the DWH in actual practice, they just are more careful about what they put in emails. Third party monitoring of BOP maintenance remains but that may soon be on the way out. With the downturn of oil prices and the resulting job insecurity it is even easier now than before to get people to not see inconvenient truths.

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Not good. He’s done an awful lot of rolling back regulations to benefit big business. None of this is going to benefit rank and file workers. It’s certainly a slap in the face to the DWH 11 as well as all the people in the Gulf who were affected by oil on their shores. My dislike of Trump no doubt colors my reply, but there are a lot of you who detested Obama, so I figure we’re even.

That said, I use facts to come to my conclusions more than the Fox watchers. I read Fortune, the Wall Street Journal, etc. His practices will mean big problems in the long run when the house of cards comes crashing down. It’s already beginning with his trade war, which is negatively affecting US businesses and farms.

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CMSP was much more than DWH. The two agencies BSEE and BOEM which currently share the former MMS’s oversight functions will continue to exist, or are there hints otherwise?

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I respect your thoughtful appraisal. I would suggest you read up on CMSP and Agenda 21, they had ominous implications. CMSP I had personal involvement with…enough said.