Greenpeace tracks Arctic seismic ship off east Greenland coast

The cross hatch marks show where TGS-Nopec is hoping to conduct its seismic survey of Baffin Bay, starting summer 2016. The pink and coral areas show where narwhal are known to spend the winter. (MAP COURTESY GREENPEACE REPORT)

Sune Scheller, a Danish Arctic Campaigner for Greenpeace, on board the Arctic Sunrise Aug. 21. (PHOTO COURTESY GREENPEACE NORDIC)

The same company that hopes to conduct seismic testing off Baffin Island’s east coast next summer is currently doing seismic testing in the Greenland Sea.

And Greenpeace campaigners want you to know what that looks and sounds like.

So a crew of 25 or so Greenpeace activists and sailors are on their way to the northeast coast of Greenland aboard their Arctic Sunrise icebreaker to record — with photos, video and audio — a TGS-Nopec 2D seismic project in real time.

“A lot of people might find it difficult to picture how this activity looks so hopefully we can shine a light on that and raise some debate around it,” said Sune Scheller, a Danish Arctic Campaigner speaking from on board the Arctic Sunrise Aug. 21.

“I think what we are witnessing up here and the results we get out of this trip will hopefully contribute to the debate happening in Nunavut — Clyde River and other indigenous communities up there — and the overall seismic testing and oil exploration in the wider Arctic region.”

Though they are known for their media-grabbing publicity stunts — hanging from bridges, climbing aboard offshore oil platforms — Greenpeace does not intend to interact with TGS-Nopec vessels or interfere with their seismic navigation, should they in fact find them, Scheller said.

They just want to document how a seismic program unfolds to inform the public, he said, to raise awareness about the impact of seismic testing on sea mammals and the potential impact of oil and gas exploration in remote areas of the Arctic, far-removed from any oil spill mitigation infrastructure.

“We don’t know a lot about this and there is strong reason to be concerned around this and to be very cautious,” he said. “We just want to make a sober contribution to a public debate.”

The journey north on board the Arctic Sunrise is part of a larger Arctic anti-oil campaign Greenpeace launched in 2012.

To fortify their fight to halt offshore oil and gas exploration in the Canadian Arctic before it starts, Greenpeace today released a 100-page report documenting years of research on the impacts of human-made noise on whale species.

Commissioned by Greenpeace Nordic — Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Norway — the 100-page report was prepared by Marine Conservation Research Ltd., a not-for-profit organization which, according to its website, studies vulnerable marine wildlife and investigates human impacts on those animals.

The report covers, in broad detail, what is known about many Arctic whale species including those that live in Baffin Bay, such as narwhal, beluga and bowhead: how they behave, how they use sound to communicate, navigate and forage for food, and how underwater sound pollution affects them.

“These species are already under pressure from human induced changes to their environment from climate change, increased pollution and harvesting,” the report says. “It is very likely that the addition of a further stressor could have significant population-level impacts.”

The release of this report, and the journey of the Arctic Sunrise to Greenland’s east coast, is certainly timely.

This week, the Federal Court of Appeal ruled against the people of Clyde River Aug. 17 in their bid to stop a five-year TGS-Nopec seismic testing program scheduled to begin in Baffin Bay and Davis Strait in summer 2016. Opponents are now hoping the Supreme Court will hear their case.

Many Nunavummiut worry that loud blasts from the array of seismic air guns will disorient, strand or scare away the whales and fish they harvest — and may even permanently damage sea mammal hearing.

In a news release issued by Greenpeace, Clyde River Mayor Jerry Natanine, who is leading the fight against seismic testing off shore of his Baffin community, said the survey could “decimate our way of life.”

“One would hope for a limit on the greed of oil companies,” Natanine said in the release. “This new study shows how destructive seismic blasting can be for whales yet they continue with their pursuit for oil with no regard for environmental impacts and Inuit rights.”

The Greenpeace study, entitled “A Review of the Impact of Seismic Survey Noise on Narwhal and other Arctic Cetaceans,” might provide the evidence Natanine and others need.

The authors claim that although there are gaps in research for certain species, there’s enough proof of harm by cross-referencing the impacts on similar species. And, Scheller said, according to environmental legislation, the burden of proof is on companies and governments to prove there is no impact.

“From the growing literature on the subject, it is clear that the research question should no longer be whether there is an impact from seismic noise on cetaceans, as this is indisputable, but instead, which species, subpopulations, and critical habitats are likely to be at most risk.”

In their submission to the federal court, TGS-Nopec said they will mitigate impacts of the seismic survey on marine mammals off Baffin Island in several ways, including turning the air gun off when they detect, through an acoustic monitor, marine mammals, and by hiring Inuit monitors to be on board their vessels.

There are no scientists on board the Arctic Sunrise, Scheller said, but he and his colleagues are recording, as best they can, whale and other wildlife sightings during their trip.

The team left Amsterdam Aug. 4 and arrived in Nuuk Aug. 16. After offering tours to local residents and school groups, the ship departed Nuuk on Aug. 17.

At the time of our conversation, the ship was in Denmark Strait, somewhere between Greenland and Iceland, hundreds of nautical miles from their final destination around 75º-80º North latitude.

TGS-Nopec has a licence to survey 7,000 miles of seismic lines this summer in the Greenland Sea on behalf of a consortium of oil and gas companies including Shell, Conoco Phillips and Chevron, Scheller said. The area in question is just north of the Svalbard archipelago of islands.

This is the fifth summer TGS-Nopec has been surveying this area. Roughly 11,000 square kilometres in the vicinity are currently under Greenlandic oil and gas exploration licenses, he added.

The seismic company is hoping next summer to survey an area in Baffin Bay covering a linear distance of more than 16,000 kilometres, according to the Greenpeace report.

Using an array of air guns, the company hopes to produce pulses of sound that will penetrate the sea floor. The reflected sounds are then detected with instruments and used to map linear cross sections of the sea floor in search of potential hydrocarbon sources.

According to the report, the air guns will emit sounds estimated to reach 230 decibels at a distance of one metre, repeat those pulses every 13 to 15 seconds and do so 24 hours a day while operating.

A jet engine emits 150 decibels at take-off, at a distance of 25 metres. Live rock music can reach 110 decibels.

A map of hydrocarbon exploration and exploitation licence blocks around Greenland. Greenpeace’s Arctic Sunrise icebreaker is on its way to the far northeastern region, in the upper right corner of the map. (MAP COURTESY GREENPEACE REPORT)