Vessel Noise Reduction Benefits Endangered Whales - Sara Adams
About Sara Adams
Sarah Adams is program manager for Maritime Blue’s Quiet Sound. She works to develop and implement voluntary measures for maritime vessels using Puget Sound. The aim is to protect resident southern killer whales, an endangered population numbering less than 80 individuals. Sara wors to understand the nuances behind the challenges that the vessels face and strives to develop a strong relationship. She believes it’s really important to build a coalition that is strong and respectful. She is always willing to listen and hear and expand beyond the assumptions that are brought to the table.
Bringing Commerce and Environmental Interests Together to Voluntarily Help the Whales
Puget Sound is home to more than 200 fish species, more than 100 seabird species, and marine mammals including killer whales. But beyond being a very important marine ecosystem, Puget Sound is also a major driver of Washington's maritime economy. The recovery of the Southern killer whale residents, designated as endangered in the United States under the Endangered Species Act in 2005, has had a challenging time recovering. There are currently about 76 individuals. Three major threats to the orcas' recovery are toxins in the water, prey availability, and disturbance that comes from vessel presence and the noise from that vessels. In 2021 the Washington State legislature appropriated funding for the Quiet Sound program, nestled underneath the Maritime Blue, a nonprofit focused on sustainability and the blue economy. Quiet Sound began by implementing a voluntary slowdown for maritime vessels and since implemented further ways to help the whales while minding the needs of the commercial vessels.
-
00:00:03 Pam Ferris-Olson Today on the Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist series podcast on womenmindthewater.com, I'm speaking with Sarah Adams. Sarah is program manager for Maritime Blue’s Quiet Sound. It's a coalition working to reduce the effects of acoustic and physical disturbances of large commercial vessels in Washington's Puget Sound. Sarah’s philosophy of “do work and be good to work with” is meant to make people feel respected, heard, and part of the solution. It's key in the success of the Quiet Sound program.
00:00:41 Pam Ferris-Olson Sarah Adams is the latest guest on the Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast on womenmindthewater.com. The podcast engages artists in conversation about their work and explores their connection with the water. Through their stories, Wo(men) Mind the Water hopes to inspire and encourage action to protect water and all the creatures that depend on.
00:01:05 Pam Ferris-Olson Sarah Adams lives and works in Washington's Puget Sound area. She's program manager for a coalition developing and implementing voluntary measures for commercial vessels. For example, adoption of vessel quieting technology is a measure aimed at protecting resident southern killer whales.
00:01:29 Pam Ferris-Olson Welcome, Sarah. It is heartening to hear that commercial vessels, part of the Puget Sound marine community, can be described as environmental stewards willing to take corrective actions to protect the whales. Tell us about Puget Sound. What is special about the area in terms of its ecology and its economic importance?
00:01:53 Sara Adams Yeah, thanks so much, Pam, for having me on this podcast. Yeah, the Puget Sound is a beautiful, beautiful area. I moved here about 10 years ago and have no intent on leaving. It has a rich ecosystem for the marine environment, specifically because we have fresh water coming off of our mountains mixing with the salt water at the Pacific Ocean. And it makes this beautiful habitat for a variety of marine species.
00:02:24 Puget Sound is home to over 200 fish species and over 100 seabird species, and of course, marine mammals, including our beloved orcas. But beyond being a very important marine ecosystem, Puget Sound is also a major driver of Washington's maritime economy between the Port of Seattle and the Port of Tacoma, collectively managed by the Northwest Seaport Alliance. Those 2 ports serve over 47 direct connections to other ports throughout the world. We have 14 shipping lines that call our ports internationally regularly and four domestic ones that serve Hawaii and Alaska. Maritime sector is a huge part of our economy. In Washington alone, the sector, so everything from logistics to shipbuilding to maintenance to parts, supplies over 170,000 jobs and generates over $45 billion in revenue. We also have a big cruise industry here. It's wrapping up in October. 15 cruise lines visit the Port of Seattle every year. And so it's an area that requires close collaboration between folks working in the environmental sector and folks who are working in maritime industry as the success of everyone depends on a healthy, thriving ecosystem.
00:04:05 Pam Ferris-Olson Okay, so you explained that the maritime industry is important to the economy. Tell us what kind of vessels work in the area.
00:04:15 Sara Adams Yeah, it's a great question. So the vessels that are predominantly, that I'm interfacing with, are these large commercial vessels. So container ships which are those very, very large, up to four football field, large vessels that have those sort of Lego blocks on them. Those blocks go directly onto a drayage truck and those get transported through rails and truck systems across the United States. Also have car carriers. So anyone who's ever purchased a car, that car came very likely on boats. There is bulk carriers and tankers who carry everything from grain and gravel to molasses and oil as well. And then, of course, you have the work boats. You have tugs who are helping every large vessel park at these docks. They help transport and guide tankers, especially through environmentally sensitive areas in case there's any sort of loss of engine power. They can make sure that there is no accident that happens because of that.
00:05:28 Sara Adams And of course, there's also recreational and fishing vessels. I personally don't work with the recreational and fishing vessels. I focus predominantly on those large commercial vessels.
00:05:40 Pam Ferris-Olson Okay, so what type of marine life is found in the area? And specifically, what is a southern resident killer whale? Yeah, and why has Maritime Blue designated the southern resident killer whale as a species they want to protect?
00:05:56 Sara Adams Yes, that's a great question. So there's many different marine species that call Puget Sound home. And whales alone, even yesterday. There was orcas. There was a gray whale and I think a minke whale also in the Sound yesterday. So lots of whales here.
00:06:15 Sara Adams For folks who aren't familiar, yes, we have two different ecotypes of orcas here. We have the southern resident killer whales, and those are the endangered population. They feed primarily on Chinook salmon, which is also a threatened species. There's also the transient killer whales or also known as Biggs killer whales. And those are the whales that eat seals and sea lions. So they have a very plentiful diet here in Puget Sound, and they are doing just fine.
00:06:50 Sara Adams The Southern residents were designated as endangered in the United States under the Endangered Species Act in 2005. In the 1970s here, these whales were rounded up for aquaria. I imagine at the time, these folks who did this did not know that this was a limited resource but in fact it was and that caused the population to really flatten, and they've had a really challenging time recovering since. We saw a peak up to, I think, 98 in the late 90s, but it's been declining a bit since. However, in the past year, we have had the birth of two calves and they are seemingly still doing well. So we are currently at 76 Southern resident killer whales.
00:07:44 Sara Adams So the reason why my program, the Quiet Sound program, focuses on this is that back in 2017, then Governor Jay Inslee, signed an executive order creating what was called the Orca Task Force to look at what were the threats facing this species and what could be done for them. So this task force ultimately developed over 20 recommendations. They identified 3 major threats to the orcas' recovery. The first was toxins in the water, these contaminants that bioaccumulate in the whales. The second was prey availability. So are there enough of this Chinook salmon for them? So if they ate anything else, that'd be great, but unfortunately they have a very picky palate and so they want that Chinook salmon. And then finally is the disturbance that comes from vessel presence and the noise from that vessels.
00:08:49 Sara Adams So then fast forward a few years, 2021 the state legislature appropriated some funding to officially become the Quiet Sound program. And we were nestled underneath the Maritime Blue program. Maritime Blue is a nonprofit focused on sustainability and the blue economy. And we were …there was a number of organizations at the table who were sort of thinking about how to operationalize these recommendations. There's a program up in Canada called the Echo Program out of the Vancouver-Frasier Port Authority that's been running for a few years longer than us. And so folks from NOAA, the Port of Seattle, Port Tacoma, Seaport Alliance, Pacific Merchant Shipping Association were familiar with this program and saw it had a really positive impact. So they said, “Hey why don't we do something like that right down here, given the similarities between our two regions.” So with that, we started the Quiet Sound program. The next year, we implemented our first voluntary slowdown program and ever since have been implementing new programs every year.
00:10:05 Pam Ferris-Olson So how is the Southern Resident Killer Whale important to the ecology of Puget Sound and the economy?
00:10:14 Sara Adams Yeah, that's a good question. So I guess first and foremost, the Southern residents are very significant, very culturally significant to many different Indigenous communities here in the Pacific Northwest including but not limited to the Tulalip tribes, the Suquamish tribe, the Lummi tribe, and the Makah tribe. Many Indigenous communities view the southern residents as kin. And as sovereign nations, these tribes have been the ones stewarding these lands since time immemorial, not only the orcas, but of course their primary food source, the Chinook. So, you know, the loss of this species not only would have, you know, tremendous impacts on the whole food chain but also all these different communities who regard these animals in such high regard.
00:11:16 Sara Adams Beyond that, anyone who's been here in Puget Sound in summer knows that orcas are a big tourism draw for us. Of course, we have vessel approach regulations so whale watchers can't, you know, do not follow the southern residents. They will prioritize, of course, the transients. But anyone who can see them from shore, if you're ever on Vashon or even Whidbey in Colbos Passage, you sometimes get lucky and you can run out to the shore just in time to see them passing by. Even down by the aquarium, there is a resource called the Whale Trail that shows you a bunch of different great locations to break out those binoculars and look for the whales when they're in the area.
00:12:09 Pam Ferris-Olson So Mission Blue instituted its Quiet Sound program to help reduce the acoustic and physical disturbances of marine traffic. Could you describe what those acoustic disturbances are and how they physically disturb the whales?
00:12:25 Sara Adams Yes, great question. So the Puget Sound, really all of Puget Sound, is designated as critical habitat for the southern residents. So that means that these whales utilize nearly all of this area for foraging, for hunting, and for reproducing. And unfortunately, our commercial shipping lanes, so those sort of traffic lanes that we have in the middle of the sound, they run straight through that critical habitat. So that means these vessels and the whales are often sharing space. And for these whales, noise is their primary method for understanding where they are, understanding where other whales are, where the fish are, where the boundaries of the topography of the ocean are. And so sound is really, really, really important to them. It's almost like eyesight for us. And research has shown that when in the presence of these vessels, the Southern Residents will forage less and they'll hunt less. As noise increases near them, they become, they hunt less, and when they do hunt, they're spending more energy trying to echolocate louder. And they're less successful in actually getting that food. So in a situation where there is not quite enough salmon for them already, making it harder for them to find the food and having them spend more of that metabolic demand finding that food is not what we want.
00:14:13 Sara Adams They use echolocation to communicate and talk and sort of find where those fish are. And the low frequency noise that is generated by these large vessels overlaps with the frequencies that they use for echolocation. Most of the noise that a vessel produces underwater is coming from the propeller. It's a process called cavitation. As the propeller spins, these bubbles form and then as the bubbles collapse, it creates a large sound. So I think many folks think of noise and they think of engine noise and that's a very important thing to also keep in mind for crew habitability and passenger comfort but we very rarely think about the noise that's generated underwater and how that propagates out and impacts these whales.
00:15:12 Pam Ferris-Olson So how do you go about reducing these disturbances? I don't imagine it's as simple as installing speed limit signs or traffic lights. [laugh]
00:15:22 Sara Adams Yeah, definitely. Yes, I wish. One thing that vessels can do that will immediately reduce their noise is slow down. Vessels are often designed to have sort of a range of optimum speed for noise and also their emissions. And so we've worked with the maritime community to define what is sort of the safest, slowest speed that they can operate at by reducing that noise or propeller is spinning a little bit slower and then less bubbles are coming out and they're creating less underwater noise. That's an immediate thing that vessels can do. And it's something that we've used. We implement a seasonal slowdown every year. It's actually on right now. It started about two weeks ago, where we overlap it for when the whales are most typically in Puget Sound. We joke that it would be great to usher the whales all in for a certain amount of time, and everyone slows down for that time, and then they leave and then we're done. But, of course, the whales have their own. So it doesn't always overlap exactly, but we do our best.
00:16:43 Sara Adams And so during our slowdown, we ask these large commercial vessels, those containers, car carriers, cruise lines, bulkers, tankers, general cargo ships, as they're entering Puget Sound through Admiralty Inlet, we ask them to reduce their speed. And in turn, that reduces underwater noise. So that's sort of an operational thing that can be done immediately. There's other things that can be done operationally, such as keeping your hull clean.
00:17:11 Sara Adams So sort of having a cleaner hull means less drag and so your engine has to work not as hard to move through the water at the same speed. And there's a number of other technologies that can be deployed or vessel design. Naval architecture gets very complicated very fast but there is a movement and guidance from the International Maritime Association on how to either design a quieter vessel or, when retrofitting a vessel, how to consider noise to also reduce noise.
00:17:51 Pam Ferris-Olson That's fascinating. I've learned a lot. Thank you. So what's been the most challenging aspect of building and working to get this coalition together?
00:18:03 Sara Adams Yeah, it's a great question. I think there was buy-in from the very beginning. Our leadership committee, there's 12 different organizations on it, ranging from state government, federal agencies such as NOAA, environmental nonprofits, tribal governments, maritime industry. So sort of from the very beginning, there's been real partnership across all these actors, knowing that together we can devise something, a voluntary program that could really make a big difference for these whales. Of course, there's state and federal regulations on how close these vessels can get. But having a voluntary program like our Admiralty Inlet Slowdown has shown to be very successful because in order for me to implement a program that is successful, I need to work with the maritime industry. I need to understand what does their daily reality look like? What does it actually mean to be a vessel transiting these long distances? What are the constraints that they're working within? What are the safety concerns that they have to deal with? So I have to really listen and understand in order to design something that is going to be practical. And with it being practical, then it has a higher success of being successful.
00:19:44 Sara Adams So for example, our slowdown, we typically see about 70% of piloted vessels voluntarily reducing their speed when transiting through the slowdown zone when the slowdown is in effect. And we think that is great. 70%, considering that these companies, there is no financial incentive. We recognize them publicly if that's what they want. But really, it's a matter of myself working with the maritime industry, working with these different shipping companies with their operations team, working with the Coast Guard to reach vessels who are not consistently calling our ports, who may be sort of here on a one-off job assignment, who may not know that they're transiting an area with endangered whale species. So it's really about how can we work together to implement something that makes sense for the maritime industry as well.
00:20:44 Sara Adams People ask, what about the vessels that don't participate? And the large majority of them, the reasons why they cannot participate is if our slowdown takes place in September through January. And those are stormy, stormy months at sea. Oftentimes, there will be an offshore weather system that they're trying to come in from and trying to take safe harbor from. For vessels going up to Alaska, they often have to catch a tidal flood in order to meet their schedules. If, for some reason, a crane breaks in the port or there is a delay or not enough tugs to help them get in, if these vessels miss their shipping berthing assignment, that is 10s of thousands of dollars in longshore labor for them. So it's, you know, we always say, you know, please participate if it's safe and operationally feasible. We never want to do something that is going to make anything on the water, unsafe, right?
00:21:54 Sara Adams That's a bigger risk to the Southern residents for sure. So with that, it really cultivated a deep understanding and appreciation amongst all these different stakeholders of where my expertise ends and where yours begins and how we can work together to find something that works. Ultimately, these companies, as long as they can fit it into their scheduling as long as they have advance enough notice, they're more than happy to do this. It is not a huge burden for them. So they're often partners with us rather than, you know, they see the value in it. So it's not like, it doesn't take much convincing.
00:22:46 Pam Ferris-Olson So Sarah, I want to ask you to share some insight into what is necessary to build a coalition that will bring people together to make a difference.
00:22:58 Sara Adams I think especially coming from the maritime space, I think it's a few things. I think on a sort of practical level, understanding that these companies, they’re companies, right? Their goal is profit. But they also have stakeholders. And a lot of those stakeholders want to see planet in their values. They want to see that the environment is an important thing for them. So they have sort of an obligation to demonstrate that if that is a value, they say that they stand by, that they're actually doing something about it. Second, I think understanding that these waters are not our waters. These animals have been here for far, far longer than we have. And the collapse of these systems would be terrible for all of us. It would have huge implications for all of us. And so there's a real sort of, I think, tapping into people's connection to what this means for them personally and intrinsically.
00:24:11 Sara Adams I think sometimes there is a bit of a misconception of big, bad industry. I think that when you engage with people on a person-to-person level, these folks live here, they play here, their kids live here, their grandparents and parents lived here. We have a lot more in common I think than we think. And I think assuming positive intent and really working to understand the nuance behind the challenges that they face and really grounding that work and having a strong relationship, a really sincere understanding of who these people are as people first, and then how that trickles into what their jobs are. I think is really important to building a coalition that is strong and respectful. And even if there's opposing viewpoints, is always willing to listen and hear and expand beyond what we, any sort of assumptions that we bring to the table.
00:25:35 Pam Ferris-Olson Well, thank you, Sarah, for being here. Listening to you has been very educational. And besides being informative, it's being heartwarming to know that things are being done.
00:25:50 Pam Ferris-Olson I'd like listeners to know that I've been speaking with Sarah Adams. Sarah is program manager for Maritime Blues Quiet Sound. Sarah has been making a difference for the endangered southern resident killer whales in Washington's Puget Sound. Sarah is the latest guest on the Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast. The series can be viewed on womenmindthewater.com and YouTube. An audio-only version of this podcast and a transcript are available on womenmindthewater.com on iTunes and Spotify.
00:26:27 Pam Ferris-Olson Wo(men) Mind the Water is grateful to Jaine Rice for the use of her song Women of Water. Credit for photos of vessels belongs to Cindy Roush via Orca Network. All rights for the Wo(men) Mind the Water name and logo belong to Pam Ferris-Olson. This is Pam Ferris-Olson.