World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Canada, one of Canada’s largest conservation organizations, is urging the federal government to deliver a strong plan in 2024 to protect marine species from underwater noise pollution.
With Canada’s oceans getting louder — causing increasing harm to marine species — the federal government initially committed to release the first draft of its Ocean Noise Strategy in the summer 2021. The deadline for the draft Ocean Noise Strategy was later changed to 2022 with “the final strategy expected to be launched in 2023”.
As of January 2024, even the draft strategy has yet to be released.
Now, as Parliament sits for the first time in 2024, WWF-Canada is urging the government to not let another year go by without delivering the plan to protect whales, walrus and other sea life. For this reason, the organization is launching #LessNoise campaign.
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? Help us protect whales, walrus & other sea life ? Canada knows it has an underwater noise pollution problem & promised to release the 1st draft of an Ocean Noise Strategy in 2021. Tell Ottawa to release a strong strategy for #LessNoise now: https://t.co/xiP3l7VqpW pic.twitter.com/paGwVpIExW
In the darkness of the underwater world, many species rely on sound to sense their environment, navigate, communicate, find food and mates, and avoid danger. The impacts of intensifying industrialization of the ocean — increasing ship traffic, deafening seismic blasts from oil and gas activities, port expansions and the roar of marine construction — are being documented across marine ecosystems.
Underwater noise pollution can disrupt normal behaviors, impair feeding, mask communication, interfere with echolocation, increase stress levels, and even contribute to fatal ship strikes and strandings of whales.
“Some parts of the ocean are more than 100 times louder than they would be naturally — and with human activity on the ocean continuing to intensify, Canada needs a strong plan to turn down the volume now,” Hussein Alidina , WWF-Canada’s lead specialist for marine conservation, said.
“WWF-Canada is calling for not only the release of the delayed Ocean Noise Strategy, but for one strong enough to deliver meaningful, measurable and urgent action that whales and other species impacted by underwater noise pollution desperately need.”
To hit the right note, Canada’s Ocean Noise Strategy should:
Increasing ship traffic worldwide is more than doubling underwater noise every decade.
Specifically, excessive noise can cause vocal beluga whales to become separated from their calves and put endangered North Atlantic right whales at increased risk of fatal ship strikes. Underwater noise pollution has been shown to mask echolocation and communication between the 75 remaining members of the critically endangered southern resident whale population.
What is more, relatively quiet waters in northern B.C. are bracing for a massive increase in ship traffic and noise from new liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals. This could have detrimental impacts on orcas, humpback, and fin whales.
In the Arctic, where walrus mother and calves recognize each other by voice and bowhead whales sing 24 hours a day in the winter to woo mates, underwater noise levels have doubled in just seven years. As sea ice disappears, so does this physical barrier that once dampened sounds from above the surface.