Save the Whales! Park Your Car.

The quest for more oil and natural gas is turning the oceans into a cacophony, from the perspective of whales and dolphins. These are among the smartest creatures on the planet; a dolphin can recognize itself in the mirror, a hallmark of intelligence. (There are certain difficulties performing the experiment with whales.) Airguns used in seismic surveys for oil and gas, peak at up to 259 decibels and can be repeated every 10 seconds for months. The noise interferes with the animals’ feeding, communication, mating, and navigation, and may be involved in beachings. Furthermore, these sounds travel more than 2,000 miles from the source, according to an alliance of wildlife groups attending the United Nations Environment Programme’s Convention on Migratory Species conference in Rome. There are 90 seismic survey ships in the world, and one quarter are in use in any one day, according to a report released at the conference, “ Ocean Noise: Turn it Down.”

Greenhouse gas emissions [ED: as in driving your car, allegedly] are aggravating the problem, causing a projected increase of the ocean’s acidity. This allows sound to travel further in water. By 2050, a projected 0.3 pH units of acidity– a conservative estimate by Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change– will broadcast sound waves 70 percent further (as predicted in the Oct 1, 2008 Geophysical Research Letters by Keith Hester et al.).

Meanwhile, the retreat of the polar ice shelf is causing a scramble for drilling and oil and gas exploration in the arctic, which will expose species such as the beluga and the bowhead whales. Ship noise is also a problem for cetaceans. It’s doubled every decade for the past 40 years. An estimated 300 naval sonar systems can generate pressure sound waves >235 decibels, or 1,000,000,000 times louder than the 145 decibel upper limit deemed safe for humans.