The Energy Question Episode 65 Meghan Lapp

The Energy Question

The Energy Question Episode 65 Meghan Lapp

September 13, 2023

In Episode 65 of The Energy Question, David Blackmon talks with Meghan Lapp, Fisheries Liaison for Seafreeze Shoreside, about the impacts of offshore wind on the commercial fishing industry and sea mammals, including whales.

Run of show:

1:30 - Intro to Meghan and her various assignments

4:30 - Meghan describes offshore wind's impacts on the commercial fishing industry in the northeast. Issues include potential net entanglements, wind farm interference with radar, lack of awareness by regulators, Coast Guard.

7:40 - Government's failure to exercise precautionary principle required by law.

9:30 - BOEM skirting of NEPA requirements. Refusal to conduct required environmental impact studies.

13:30 - Overall lack of enforcement vis a vis offshore wind by regulators.

15:00 - Population-level impacts on Atlantic Cod by NE offshore wind farms.

16:00 - Huge difference between wind's nameplate capacity and actual power delivery.

17:30 - BOEM itself admits offshore wind will have no beneficial impact on global climate change.

19:00 - Offshore Wind impacts on whales. Meghan reviews recent congressional testimony at a legislative briefing.

20:30 - Heavy correlation between whale deaths and conduct of offshore wind seismic surveys. Many of these whales are endangered species. These surveys are largely unregulated.

22:00 - Meghan explains that the East Coast is a "migratory superhighway" for a large number of whale species. BOEM admits the surveys will cause "temporary deafness" in these whales, placing them in mortal danger, since whales detect ship traffic with their sense of hearing.

24:50 - Meghan describes U.S. agency experiments on Baleen whales being conducted in Norway, because in Norway, they eat whales. The experiments are unimaginably cruel.

Link to article about cruel whale experiments conducted by the U.S. government in Norway:

https://www.voanews.com/a/experiment-halted-in-norway-after-whale-drowns/7126928.html#:~:text=Minke%20whales%20are%20the%20second,or%208%20meters%20in%20length.&text=A%20controversial%20research%20project%20in,%22cruel%20and%20pointless%22%20experiments.