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What a year to celebrate World Ocean Day - with an unprecedented and still uncontrolled oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico focusing public and political attention on marine ecosystems, suddenly the work that we do has a renewed sense of relevance and value!
This week I am in DC participating in the 10th annual Capitol Hill Ocean Week (CHOW) - the Alaska SeaLife Center is actively supporting the event. The theme for CHOW is ocean energy - as all speakers to date have noted, that theme was selected a year in advance but is particularly prescient in view of the Deepwater Horizon blowout and spill, now at Day 50!
I started the morning with a depressing, but helpful breakfast briefing organized by AZA on the impact of the spill on wildlife - our colleagues Dr Joe Smith at the Fort Wayne Childrens Zoo and John Hewitt at the Audubon Aquarium in New Orleans gave a riveting report from the frontline. So far more than 1,000 seabirds and > 50 turtles and some 8 dolphins have been "processed". The challenges of their work had an eery resemblance to the stories that I have heard from Pam Tuomi and others involved in the Exxon Valdez response. Clearly, there is a lack of preparedness to respond adequately to disasters of this magnitude, despite the vast intellectual capital and amazing support provided by all members of the national strandings response and aquarium communities.
I left the briefing wondering about the future for the Gulf and what we must do in Alaska to be better prepared for a future that will likely continue to involve oil production for the best part of this century. Even when the blowout has been shut down and the promised Gulf of Mexico restoration work underway, I can't help but wonder whether we are really committed to the long term energy reform that is esential if future spills like this one, Exxon Valdez and the many others that preceded it are to be avoided.
It was therefore most encouraging to hear, later in the morning, Interior Secretrary Ken Salazar speak about how marine, energy and climate policy intersect - he took the opportunity to launch a new Federal partnership with 10 Atlantic States to develop a new program on reneweable energy. I applauded his leadership, but wondered if that change will happen fast enough and at a level that makes a fundamental difference.
On this Ocean Day 2010, I hope that all of us recommit to doing all that we can to ensure the health of our global ocean that makes possible life on this planet (note that in the context of this special day it is a single ocean). What more can the Alaska SeaLife Center do to help Alaska be better prepared to deal with oil and other threats to our oceans? What more can we do to work more closely with industry and communities to promote a greater level of ocean stewardship? What more can we do to demonstrate leadership in use of renewable energy?
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