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DNR gets Alaska coastal impact grant
The U.S. Department of the Interior’s Minerals Management Service has approved a $150,000 grant to the Alaska Department of Natural Resources for hydro-acoustic monitoring of ambient noise and marine mammals in the Chukchi Sea.
MMS said this is the first Alaska grant provided through the Coastal Impact Assistance Program.
The grant money will be used to monitor levels of both natural and anthropogenic sources of noise off the Alaska coast. This will contribute to the growing data on sound and its sources — ranging from marine mammal calls, to ships to the background noise from ice in the Chukchi Sea.
Partnering with DNR “MMS is pleased to begin funding important environmental projects and studies in the state of Alaska through the Coastal Impact Assistance Program,” said MMS Alaska Regional Director John Goll. “In this first grant, we are proud to partner with the Alaska Department of Natural Resources to support a study of key interest to North Slope residents and subsistence hunters.”
Alaska’s CIAP plan was approved by MMS Sept. 30. CIAP was created by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and provides $250 million annually, from 2007-10, to six eligible Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas producing states — Louisiana, Alabama, Alaska, California, Mississippi, and Texas. The funding to Alaska included $2.5 million for each of the fiscal years 2007 and 2008.
—Petroleum News
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