FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date Published: March 3, 2021
Washington, DC — Last week, Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) submitted comments on the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the South Fork Wind Farm project in federal waters off New England and Long Island. In 65 pages, addressed to new Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) director Amanda Lefton, RODA detailed that the DEIS was issued “at a time of significant confusion and change in the U.S. approach to offshore wind energy (OSW) planning,” pointed out numerous analytical, factual, and typographical errors, and urged Lefton to “improve the broken federal OSW process before consideration of additional projects or lease announcements.”
Our letter urged the Biden Administration to create a national strategy that prioritizes food security, environmental protection, and participatory governance, along with a comprehensive energy plan that provides transparency regarding energy production, costs, and regional grid and transmission considerations for offshore wind. If such a plan is notadopted before project approval, basic mitigation measures should be enacted at a minimum. These include:
Establish safe transit areas through the 1400 square mile New England lease areas;
Ensure better federal environmental review analysis and clear identification of scientific unknowns;
Monitor fisheries impacts for the life of projects and utilize adaptive management;
Resolve impacts to National Marine Fisheries Service stock assessment surveys;
Prohibit turbines in sensitive habitat including spawning areas and high-value fishing grounds;
Improve communications with fishermen in culturally appropriate formats;
Perform “micrositing” of turbines and cables with fishermen who know the ecosystem;
Establish science-based, inclusive, and predictable plans for compensatory mitigation of impacts to fishing communities;
Standardize processes for gear loss claims;
Address interference from turbines to marine radar;
Require deicing technology and practices;
Ensure that any economic benefits of offshore wind accrue to the U.S.—not at some undetermined point in the future, but now.
To be clear, none of these requests are new—nor hardly radical. They have simply been ignored again, and again, and again in a political push/pull between multinational energy companies and the U.S. government, leaving world-famous seafood, and the communities founded around its harvest, off the table.
It would appear that fishing communities are the only ones screaming into a void while public resources are sold to the highest bidder, as BOEM has reversed its decision to terminate a project after receiving a single letter from Vineyard Wind. A Federal Register notice posted this morning indicates that BOEM is resuming the review of the Construction and Operations Plan for the Vineyard Wind project as the developer “has indicated that its proposed COP is ‘a decision pending before BOEM,’” in a private communication dated January 22, 2021- a far cry from “public” engagement. This is irreconcilable with the plain language of BOEM’s announcement terminating the project’s review last December.
BOEM’s duty as a federal agency is to provide a transparent, structured, legal, and public process for making decisions about public lands and resources that affect all Americans—not to allow one tentacle to wag the octopus. Adding to the confusion, the Biden Administration’s revocation of the “one federal decision” process for infrastructure projects such as these means the public has no information as to how decisions will be made. RODA commented at length on the defective Vineyard Wind process in our comments regarding the South Fork DEIS, and now again urge BOEM to at least hold public hearings explaining to the public how a private company can resume a project terminated by the federal government without further inquiry.
Unlike offshore wind advocates who lack an intricate understanding of our marine ecosystems, the late stages of the environmental review projects do not leave many commercial fishing communities with optimism, excitement, or hope for their existence. The process has been one-sided, without leadership, and riddled with lost opportunities for co-planning and mitigation.
BOEM is legally required to prevent unreasonable interference to fishing operations from offshore wind development. Recent experience has shown us that muddling through matters as important as energy security, food production, and environmental effects of large-scale industrialization without a clear path or understanding of unintended consequences is a recipe for disaster. Will we choose to do better?
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About Responsible Offshore Development Alliance:
Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) is a broad membership-based coalition of fishing industry associations and fishing companies — across the United States — committed to improving the compatibility of new offshore development with their businesses. The alliance works to directly collaborate with relevant regulatory agencies (e.g., National Marine Fisheries Service, Bureau of Ocean Energy management, U.S. Coast Guard, fishery management councils, and state agencies), offshore developers, scientists, and others to coordinate science and policy approaches to managing development of the Outer Continental Shelf in a way that minimizes conflicts with existing traditional and historical fishing.
On a windy stretch of ocean ten miles northeast of Martha’s Vineyard lies the watery grave of America’s first major offshore wind farm.
This is where a Boston-based company called Energy Management planned to build 130 Statue of Liberty-sized turbines, enough to supply power to 200,000 homes.
But the project known as Cape Wind never made it beyond the planning stages. Facing relentless opposition from wealthy homeowners on Nantucket Sound, including the billionaire industrialist William Koch and the late Democratic senator Edward Kennedy, it drowned in a sea of lawsuits over 16 years. Energy Management declared it dead in December 2017.
Cape Wind’s historic failure, even as Europe and Asia add more offshore wind farms every year, has become an infamous cautionary tale for the wind development industry. It seemed the US was destined to lag behind its peers.
But now the playing field has changed. The costs of offshore wind plummeted by 64% between 2012 and 2018, mainly thanks to the invention of ever-larger turbines and deepening supply chains tied to Europe. Democrat-led states in New England have championed offshore wind as a way to take advantage of the high wind speeds off the coast and save space along crowded waterfront towns and cities while providing zero-carbon electricity.
“There are strong factors in favor of offshore wind,” said Maxwell Cohen, an analyst at Wood Mackenzie, a consultancy. “In the Northeast, it’s where the strongest wind resources are located, and then you lay on top of that an economic development argument, as there are all these port facilities that would facilitate it…It starts to create a pretty compelling argument.”
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“But the real catalyst is that it is getting cheaper,” he said.
The result is a huge pipeline of 20-some mammoth projects waiting to pick up the necessary approvals and permits. States have committed to sign contracts for as many as 30 or more gigawatts of offshore wind power capacity by 2030 — the equivalent of around 15 nuclear power plants. A handful of large companies, including European firms like Denmark’s Orsted and Norway’s Equinor, will spend some $70 billion on offshore wind along the East Coast and provide jobs for 40,000 people by the end of the decade, according to a 2019 analysis by the Special Initiative for Offshore Wind (SIOW), an independent unit of the University of Delaware’s College of Earth, Ocean and Environment.
Names of some of the offshore wind projects companies plan to build along the East Coast. Vineyard … [+]
AMERICAN WIND ENERGY ASSOCIATION (AWEA), MARCH 2020
The very first of these projects, called Vineyard Wind 1, is in some respects a larger, higher-tech successor to Cape Wind. Its 57 to 100 turbines will each stretch nearly 700 feet in the air. With likely spacing of one nautical mile between each turbine, the turbines would sprawl across 160,000 acres — nearly the size of New York City.
But last week, in a long-awaited study, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) re-characterized the likely adverse effects of future offshore wind farms on commercial fisheries as “major.” It was a sign that the developers of Vineyard Wind 1 — a joint venture called Vineyard Wind that consists of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and renewables company Avangrid — will need to work harder to appease the East Coast’s fishing industry.
“Major cumulative effects could occur on commercial fisheries,” the report warned, largely due to the potential for boat traffic congestion and lack of space for boats towing large trawling nets. The report also noted that climate change will be a contributing factor.
It was a blow not just to Vineyard Wind 1 but to the many other projects that hope to follow.
“Everybody in the industry has been holding their breath to see how BOEM is going to treat those ‘cumulative effects’ for Vineyard,” said Julia Wood, a partner at law firm Van Ness Feldman. “It’s widely expected that whatever approach BOEM takes here, it could take across the board” for wind farms seeking a federal permit.
Developers might have hoped that the BOEM study would allow them to focus on other obstacles to future wind development, such as ensuring that states stick to their promises to buy generous amounts of electricity from future offshore wind farms. Instead, they now face more discussions with the fishing industry.
Fishing industry’s clout
In the East, the fishing industry is a heavyweight.
New England and the Atlantic states created around $2 billion in economic value and provided tens of thousands of jobs in 2017, according to a 2018 report by the National Marine Fisheries Service, a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Under President Donald Trump, it has also enjoyed greater political influence. Earlier this month, fishing groups applauded when Trump signed an executive order to lift commercial fishing limits at a marine sanctuary off New England.
Wind turbine manufacturers like Siemens, MHI Vestas and GE Renewable Energy continue to build larger … [+]
INTERNATIONAL ENERGY AGENCY, OFFSHORE WIND OUTLOOK 2019
Its clout was on display last year when, as Vineyard Wind 1 was seeking one of several permits it needs from the federal government, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) refused to sign off, saying that the concerns of the fishing industry had not been fully addressed. BOEM, the lead agency for the permitting, chafed at its rejection. “We hope that, on reflection, NMFS will concur with our conclusion,” wrote one BOEM official in a private letter to NMFS, according to a Reuters report in July 2019.
In the end, it was BOEM that was forced to agree. In August, BOEM announced that it would pause the permitting process while it undertook a supplemental study of the offshore wind industry’s “cumulative effects.” It was the results of that supplemental study which were released last week.
Reached for this article, a Vineyard Wind spokesperson said it “look[s] forward to engaging with the agency and the many different stakeholders as we continue to make our way through this important public process.” Fishing groups said they welcomed the report but needed more time to digest the details.
A dispute over where turbines should go
Even so, representatives of some fishing groups are worried that their voices are not being heard.
After BOEM paused the permitting process in August, the five main wind companies vying to develop the New England coast — Equinor, Mayflower Wind, Ørsted, Eversource, and Vineyard Wind — scrambled to find a way to appease fishermen. By November, they decided they had found the perfect solution. They were wrong.
In a letter sent to the Coast Guard on November 1st, 2019, the five companies proposed to space each turbine at a distance of one nautical mile (about 1.15 actual miles) apart from every other — more separation between turbines than at any other offshore wind farm in the world. Vineyard Wind 1 as well as all future wind farms in the area could follow this grid arrangement, the letter suggested, even if it came at the cost of fitting fewer turbines inside costly lease areas.
“[T]he New England Leaseholders are proud to be working together to present a collaborative solution that we believe accommodates all ocean users in the region,” announced the letter.
It seemed like a generous offer: one nautical mile of spacing would be more than at any other offshore wind farm in the world. There was just one problem: the wind developers didn’t tell all top fishing industry groups about it.
The first that Annie Hawkins, executive director of a fishing industry group called the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA), and her colleagues learned of the plan, she said, was when a reporter from the Boston Globe called shortly before a Coast Guard press lease embargo was lifted.
“The fishing groups didn’t know anything about it,” said Hawkins. Wind developers had been in close discussions with fishing groups, but they had never mentioned that they would formally propose a 1-nautical-mile separation between turbines, she said.
In fact, fishermen say that one nautical mile is often not enough, especially for boats that tow large trawling nets behind them.
“So on January 3rd we started another proposal,” Hawkins said. “ ‘Okay, keep the one-by-one nautical mile arrangement, but also include four mile-wide transit lanes.’ ”
A transit lane is a four-mile-wide path that would pass straight through proposed wind farms. Fishermen argue that one or several transit lanes are necessary to reduce congestion on the way to and from key fishing zones and to make room for the large nets that trawlers use, as well as to ensure that wind turbines don’t cause potential radar-jamming. Wind developers would prefer to do without transit lanes: they take up precious lease area space which could otherwise be filled with turbines.
Pressed by RODA, BOEM did include transit lanes in its study. But last week’s release of that study showed that incorporating a transit lane wouldn’t substantially change the effects on fisheries, leaving it unclear whether the agency will favor that approach when it releases its next report in December.
Asked about whether wind developers had failed to brief fishing groups about their November 1st proposal, Vineyard Wind didn’t reply. But fellow offshore wind developer Eversource emphasized that the “process by which we developed the 1 x 1 nautical mile layout was inclusive. 125+ fisheries organizations and over 700 fisheries stakeholders were engaged over the course of two years for input on the Ørsted/Eversource projects alone,” said Eversource spokesman Reid Lamberty, referring to a joint venture with another wind developer.
“We’re committed to doing all we can to further minimize any impacts to commercial fishermen.”
Are offshore wind farms bad for fisheries? The evidence is unclear
Wind turbines have dotted the horizons of European countries like the UK and Germany for more than a dozen years. But the word on how they impact fisheries still falls short of conclusive. Partly that’s because offshore development proceeded largely without the input of fishermen, and fishing in or near wind farm areas is not as common as it would be in the US, meaning the issue has not attracted as much attention.
Last week’s supplemental BOEM study reached its conclusion that the cumulative effects on fisheries could be “major” by assessing dozens of individual factors, and then repeating that analysis for each of a handful of overall designs of where to place Vineyard Wind 1’s turbines and cables as well as those of future projects.
Individual, nearly all of the factors it assessed — from noise creation to the laying down of undersea cables — counted as “negligible” to “minor,” largely because many of the disruptive effects, including the actual construction of the wind farms, would only be temporary. Perhaps the most serious impact, it found, would be potential congestion of fishing traffic lanes and the risk of entanglement because of the large trawling nets that some fishing boats tow in their wake. Clam fishers, for example, often require a minimum distance of two nautical miles between structures for safe operations.
“The presence of [wind turbines] could also lead to long-term changes to fishing vessel transit routes during operations, which could affect travel time and trip costs.”
Still, the structures associated with any one wind farm on its own wouldn’t likely have “major” impacts on commercial fishing activity, the study said. It is mainly because of the combined impact of future wind farms that the study concluded the effects on commercial fishing could potentially be major, the study concludes.
A new environmental assessment of offshore wind power projects issued by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management could lead to stricter conditions for developers seeking to build new facilities off the Northeast coast.
BOEM’s new supplement to the draft environmental assessment for the Vineyard Wind facility, planned off the coast of Massachusetts, found the project posed potentially “major” adverse impacts to sea life and other industries, particularly commercial fishing.
The document is an update to the draft Environmental Impact Statement for Vineyard that BOEM issued in 2018. Last year, the agency announced it would extend the permitting process for the 800 MW facility so it could assess the impacts not just of that wind farm, but others planned by Northeastern states to meet clean energy targets.
The report released Tuesday assesses an array of construction scenarios for Vineyard and 22 gigawatts of other facilities planned in New England waters. It considers the creation of a transit lane for fishing and other sea traffic, as well as changes to the project’s turbine layout and the siting of a substation to connect the project to the onshore power grid.
BOEM will take comments on the document for 45 days from the document’s publication in the Federal Register — something that the agency says will happen in the “near future.” But already analysts say the critical findings of the new report signal Vineyard and other projectswill face more rigorous scrutiny than envisioned in the original EIS.
“At this point it seems that Vineyard may need to make some additional concessions if they can,” said Anthony Logan, a senior wind analyst at Wood Mackenzie. “Because this [report] is kind of calling out the layout of the project, and seems to clearly prefer a layout that Vineyard … said they didn’t want to do.”
Commercial fishing interests, which have opposed offshore wind development, praised the new study. The Responsible Offshore Development Alliance, a fishing group, thanked BOEM for “considering additional alternatives that would provide much-needed safe transit options for fishermen,” and the report’s finding that offshore wind will have “major cumulative fisheries impacts.”
RODA, however, still wants BOEM to go beyond issuing conditions and instead consider abandoning the project completely.
“[We] remain gravely concerned about the effects to the region’s sustainable seafood production if the proposed action is approved,” Hawkins said. “The question is whether the mitigation efforts are going to be adequate or not. And they’re not from a fisheries perspective.”
Vineyard, a joint venture of Iberdrola’s Avangrid Renewables and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, said it is still reviewing the 420-page document, but it does not anticipate any further delays to the project that is scheduled to be in service by 2023. BOEM’s decision last year to extend the EIS process has already forced the company to push its expected in-service date back by more than a year.
“We’re pleased that BOEM has published the draft [supplemental EIS] and look forward to engaging with the agency and the many different stakeholders as we continue to make our way through this important public process,” a spokesperson said via email.
Massachusetts’ elected officials have criticized BOEM over the Vineyard Wind project in the past, saying the agency is slow-walking a project that will spur the development of a major clean energy sector.
Spokespeople for Gov. Charlie Baker and Attorney General Maura Healey said their offices arereviewing the draft supplemental EIS and preparing for the public comment period. After that period, BOEM plans to issue its final Environmental Impact Statement for Vineyard in November, and a final decision on the project’s construction and operations plan in December.
The Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) has received a $150,000 grant from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to aggregate existing knowledge, then convene a first-of-its-kind symposium on the current science regarding fisheries and offshore wind interactions. The project, “Understanding the State of the Science,” will advance agency, fishing industry, offshore wind energy developer, and public understanding of existing research on interactions between the two industries.
“We are thrilled about the opportunity to design a forum that will bring together everything we know, and don’t know, about how fisheries and offshore wind energy development interact,” said Annie Hawkins, RODA’s Executive Director. “Fishermen provide a wealth of knowledge and expertise, and many are involved in research and science efforts. This project is a great opportunity for their participation in informing a strong research and science agenda.”
The project consists of two parts. First, RODA will develop a much-needed summary of scientific knowledge and current research and monitoring efforts. Given the rapid growth and large scope of offshore wind development in the U.S., many fishing associations, academic institutions, federal and state agencies, offshore wind developers, and others have been conducting research on the effects of offshore wind development. This part of the project results in a new resource for understanding the knowledge gaps and most important questions for further research.
Second, RODA will convene a “state of the science” symposium and workshop jointly with NMFS and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), as well as state, academic, and private and public sector science experts. At these meetings, participants will identify research and monitoring needs that the Responsible Offshore Science Alliance (ROSA) can use to develop its work.
ROSA is an independent organization that works collaboratively to advance regional research and monitoring of fisheries and offshore wind interactions in federal waters. It is intended to fill the need for broad-scale coordination on prioritizing work and on information sharing.
“Much of the work on offshore wind is occurring on a development-by-development, state-by-state basis. Yet the science and management of our fisheries, marine mammals, and marine endangered species occur at a regional-scale – North Carolina to Maine,” said Jon Hare, director of the Northeast Fisheries Science Center. “Therefore, I am excited to be able to work with RODA and BOEM to support the state-of-the-science symposium with the goal of developing a regional science plan.”
This project is a key step toward jointly building a regional fisheries and offshore science agenda. Participants in the project will include fishermen, fishing industry representatives, NMFS, BOEM, and ROSA experts, wind energy developers, relevant federal fishery management councils, states, and other expert scientists from the U.S. and Europe. The Consensus Building Institute will provide expert facilitation and coordination for the symposium. The intent is to reduce redundancies, identify knowledge gaps, and solidify opportunities for future increased coordination. Partners can then use workshop outcomes to collaborate further, refining regional science and monitoring agendas.
Examples of topics to be covered by the state of the science symposium include:
Physical oceanographic factors: the Mid-Atlantic Cold Pool, currents and vertical mixing, scour and sedimentation, marine winds, waves, coastal upwelling;
Ecosystem effects: larval dispersal, recruitment, spawning, electromagnetic fields, migration corridors, noise and vibrations, species shifts, invasive species and colonization, entanglement, benthic habitat disruption;
Fisheries: displacement of effort, displacement of species, increased competition for grounds, safety; and
Floating wind technology effects: specific effects of floating wind platforms on fishing effort and biological processes.
Funding for this project was made available through NMFS’ Broad Agency Announcement award process, and advances a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed in March 2019. This ten-year MOU among RODA, NMFS, and BOEM allows the groups to collaborate on the science, research, monitoring, and process of offshore wind energy development on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf. More broadly, the project will help local and regional fishing interests become better involved in the offshore wind development process, and ensure that the interests and concerns of commercial fishermen are communicated effectively.
WASHINGTON – January 16, 2020 – The Responsible Offshore Development Alliance
(RODA) is excited to announce the launch of a Pacific Advisory Committee, which brings
RODA’s mission of improving the compatibility of new offshore development with
commercial fishing to the West Coast.
As discussions of offshore wind development in the U.S. continue to progress, Pacific
fishermen have expressed significant concern over the lack of communication and
collaboration necessary to inform coexistence among ocean users.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has identified 3 Call Areas off of
California as areas of interest for offshore wind development. The strongest wind speeds
are located along the North Coast, near the BOEM Humboldt Call Area. The other two sites,
Morro Bay and Diablo Canyon, for possible development are located on the Central Coast
(For more information visit the California Offshore Wind Energy Gateway). BOEM has also
initiated a process for siting offshore wind projects off of Oregon, although it has not yet
identified Call Areas there.
The RODA-Pacific Advisory Committee is comprised of leaders from several West Coast
fisheries throughout California and Oregon. Its purpose is to improve science and policy
approaches to development, while also increasing and improving communication to help
strengthen ties between Pacific fishermen and fishing communities across the country.
As of January 1st 2020, the RODA West Coast advisory committee consists of:
– Mike Conroy, West Coast Fisheries Consultants
– Hugh Link & Tim Novotny, Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission
– Mike Okoniewski, Pacific Seafood Group
– Noah Oppenheim, Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations
– Peter Flournoy, International Law Offices of San Diego
– Steven Scheiblauer, Marine Alliances Consulting
– Lori Steele, West Coast Seafood Processors Association (WCSPA)
– Susan Chambers, WCSPA and Southern Oregon Ocean Resource Coalition
Additional Pacific fishing industry organizations and representatives are invited to contact
RODA for inquiries about membership.
RODA is a membership-based alliance of fishing businesses and communities that provides
a “strength in numbers” approach to advocacy on issues of mutual interest to seafood
harvesters, processors, and affiliated entities. It works on behalf of fishermen with
regulators, offshore developers, science experts, and others to coordinate science and
policy approaches to proposed ocean development in a way that minimizes conflicts with
existing traditional and historic fishing.
RODA SEEKS DATA ANALYST CONSULTANT with expertise in fisheries database development, data analytics, and collaborative research.
Project Description
The contractor will assist the Project Team, led by the Responsible Offshore Development Alliance (RODA) that has received funding from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) to: (1) create a fishing industry-owned and -managed integrated knowledge and database infrastructure; and (2) apply that infrastructure to evaluate consensus hypotheses with data, of the potential impacts of offshore wind energy development on the key socio-ecological dimensions of fisheries from the fishery perspective. The goal of the project is to build a “Fishery Knowledge Trust” allowing for the synthesis of expertise, perspective, and empirical evidence into products that allow the industry to speak in the ecosystem management and science arenas with “one coherent voice” and to evaluate that consensus with verified evidence. Specifically, the products developed with the infrastructure will provide those negotiating conflicts arising from the human use of ecosystem services of offshore wind energy and seafood a deeper understanding of how fishing industry sectors are likely to be impacted by offshore wind energy development, including the potential impacts of constraints arising from interactions between wind lease areas, spatial and temporal fishery management regulations, and the spatial dynamics of fishing, on business balance sheets and seafood security in the present and future.
Statement of Work
The primary role of this contractor is to support RODA and the Project Team in the development of the Knowledge Trust using skills in database development, spatial analytics, and collaborative research.
The contractor will be expected to operate independently, with little administrative support. The contract duration would be 12 months, with RODA providing support for 37 hours per month and associated travel. Necessary office space and equipment will be provided by the contractor, although reasonable exceptions may be considered.
The contractor with a strong background and training in fisheries and ecological analysis will work with PIs on a fishing industry-science collaboration to establish a Knowledge Trust to help inform resolutions of conflicts between the fishing industry and offshore wind development. The candidate must have experience designing and maintaining remote databases, processing and analyzing spatio-temporal data, including longitudinal data describing dynamics of fisheries, the ocean, and human dimensions. The candidate should have demonstrated capabilities in spatial analyses with R. Knowledge and facility with Python, SQL, MySQL, and Amazon Web Service is highly desirable. Experience with networking and database security is also valuable. The candidate is required to have a strong interest and willingness to work respectfully and productively with fishing industry experts, including commercial fishermen. Masters or Ph.D. degree is preferred, but candidates with undergraduate degrees who have exceptional backgrounds in ecological analysis, data analytics and a deep interest in collaborative research of the socio-ecology of fisheries systems will be considered.
Specific tasks the candidate will perform:
1) Provide technical support for the development of a secure network database to crowd source Fisheries Dependent Data within the Knowledge Trust.
2) Assist in the development and execution of systematic approaches to collect and synthesize tacit knowledge of fishing industry experts which will be part of the Knowledge Trust.
3) Provide analytical support for the development of spatio-temporal analyses of fisheries and other data contained within and outside the Knowledge Trust in evaluations of hypothesized impacts of wind energy development on the socioecological dimensions of fisheries.
Application Submission
Interested parties should submit a brief statement of interest, current resume including the names of 3 professional references, and proposed budget for project completion to Annie Hawkins via email at annie@rodafisheries.org no later than December 23, 2019. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the position is filled, with the selected candidate to begin work as soon as possible on or before January 20, 2020. This is a remote position, and candidates located in New England or the Mid-Atlantic regions are preferred.
RODA complies with the Federal Equal Opportunity of 1972, as amended.
At the end of October, RODA hosted a reception on Capitol Hill attended by several of our Board members, congressional staffers, and staff scientists from NMFS. Welcoming remarks were given by Congressman Lownethal (CA 47) and Dr. Cisco Werner (NOAA) in support of both RODA and ROSA’s ongoing work.
The Responsible Offshore Science Alliance (ROSA) seeks a strong leader with deep knowledge of marine resource science and management and excellent administrative and organizational skills to serve as its first Executive Director. ROSA is a new collaborative effort involving the fishing and offshore wind energy industries, federal and state government partners, and the ocean science community. Its goal is “To provide for and advance regional research and monitoring of fisheries and offshore wind interactions in federal waters through collaboration and cooperation in order to: (1) Increase salient and credible data on fisheries and wind development; and (2) Increase the understanding of the effects of wind energy development on fisheries and the ocean ecosystems on which they depend.”
The application and interview process will be conducted in October and November 2019 with a target decision date of November 22, 2019 and a target start date of the successful candidate in December 1, 2019. The position’s location is flexible but must be within the Northeast or Mid-Atlantic regions of the U.S.A. ROSA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation.
Reporting to the Board of Directors, the Executive Director (ED) will have overall strategic, financial and operational responsibility for ROSA’s implementation, growth, staff, programs, and execution of its mission. She or he will initially organize the Executive Council and other committees and in concern with them, refine ROSA’s institutional governance and operations structure.
Key Responsibilities
Leadership & Management:
Develop and execute organizational strategy for ROSA to become the leader in research focused on offshore wind energy and fisheries and their communities.
Organize and convene open, transparent, productive and efficient meetings of ROSA’s board, Council, Research Advisory Board, and committees.
Actively engage and energize ROSA board members, Council and other committee delegates, partnering organizations, and funders.
Support Board and Council members; seek and build strategic direction for organization’s buildout.
Assist board in development of overall organizational capacity; recommend timelines and resources needed to achieve strategic goals.
Ensure research and activities are in line with mission statement.
Lead, coach, and manage ROSA team of staff as organization grows.
Fundraising & Communications:
Work with federal and state agencies, offshore wind developers, academic institutions and others to expand pool of funds to support research activities and organizational expenses.
Develop and maintain system of communications with affiliated parties and the general public with the goal of creating awareness of ROSA and its mission.
Continue work of building partnerships, establishing relationships with new and existing funders, government, fishing industry, offshore wind energy industry, and scientific leaders.
Represent ROSA externally by distributing and communicating activities, milestones, and results.
Represent ROSA at key fisheries conferences, workshops, meetings related to offshore wind
Qualifications
The Executive Director will be thoroughly committed to ROSA’s mission and its stated vision of “an improved understanding of ocean ecosystems that allows for informed compatibility of renewable energy and sustainable fisheries.” All candidates should have proven experience with ocean-related research (with a preferred emphasis on fisheries research), relationship management, and collaborative approaches to addressing complex marine resource problems.
Minimum Requirements
Master’s degree in fishery science, marine resource management, marine ecology, marine biology, or closely related disciplines required, with at least 8-10 years of professional experience.
Track record of effectively designing, leading, and managing multi-disciplinary teams to address
complex problems in natural resource science and management.
Demonstrated commitment to evidence-based decision making and the unbiased pursuit of
scientific knowledge.
Familiarity with major fisheries datasets, and their collection and use.
Excellence in organizational management with the ability to manage and develop high-
performance teams, and set and achieve strategic objectives.
Past success working with diverse audiences with the ability to cultivate strong relationships and
engage in conflict resolution. The ability to work with diverse agencies, fisheries, and researchers
in a non-partisan, fair, independent, and trusted manner is essential.
Ability to effectively communicate technical data and information to non-technical audiences, and
efficiently provide information to various audiences both verbally and in writing.
Proven ability to work independently with minimal supervision.
Action-oriented, passionate, entrepreneurial, and adaptable approach to professional
responsibilities.
Travel expected to be 30 –40%
Preferred Qualifications
Ph.D. in fishery science, marine resource management, marine ecology, or closely related disciplines.
Extensive knowledge of New England and Mid-Atlantic fisheries science institutions, regulations, and practices.
History of strong relations with fishing industry participants, offshore wind energy developers, and other relevant parties.
Experience with technical, engineering, and construction related matters or ability to learn those quickly.
Familiarity with principles of meeting organization and facilitation for effective group decision making (such as Robert’s Rule of Order).
Demonstrated ability in analyses, technical writing, and oral presentations specifically relating to marine resource science and management.
Closing date October 25, 2019. To apply, submit a resume or curriculum vitae and written statement of interest by email to: careers@rosascience.org Please use “ROSA Executive Director Application” in the email subject line.
Should you wish to have your candidacy for this position held in confidence, place the word “confidential” in the subject line of the email and on your resume. It is the intent of the board to maintain confidentiality of any applicant’s name throughout the process, and all best efforts will be made to do so.
Please direct any questions about this position or recruitment announcement to Jason Peller at jpeller@rosascience.org.
