Research Document 1998/170

The Possible Environmental Impacts of Petroleum Exploration Activities on the Georges Bank Ecosystem

By P.R. Boudreau (Editor)

Abstract

A Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) Regional Advisory Process (RAP) was carried out to generate a peer-reviewed summary of the Georges Bank ecosystem and potential impacts from petroleum exploratory activities. The process included input from Canadian and USA government scientists, external reviewers and representatives from fishers groups and the petroleum industry. The review resulted in the following conclusions:

• Georges Bank is an important offshore bank that has a number of features, which, in combination with its size, make it unique.
• Routine exploratory seismic activity might have a significant but temporary impact on adult fish behaviour and movement. This might affect fish catch rates and spawning behaviour.
• Routine operational exploratory drilling activity is likely to have only localised impacts on the ecosystem components reviewed. The actual impacts will be dependent on the location, timing of the activities, and the properties of discharges. There does exist a small probability that these impacts will have population and ecosystem level impacts.
• Exploration drilling would lead to a temporary loss of access to some portion of the fishing grounds, although the area lost would be relatively small. Seismic activity would lead to temporary space conflicts with fishing activities that would depend on the timing, location and the gear types involved. This conflict would be greatest during the summer months.
• There is a low probability of a large release of petroleum product from a well blowout. If this were to occur, it might have population and ecosystem level impacts.
• Routine exploratory seismic activity could have a localised impact on eggs and larvae depending on the time of year and location.
• Production activities were not reviewed but the impacts are expected to be different, both in scale and in nature, from those considered for exploratory activities. A review of specific production proposals is needed before any assessment of these can be carried out.

This research document provides the scientific information and references to support these conclusions.

Complete document (PDF, 8,022 KB)

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