CONTACT: Andrew Souvall 

or Heather Lasher Todd 

Long Branch, NJ --- With the U.S. Department of Interior scheduled to propose federal regulations governing renewable energy exploration--which could include windmills-- on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) and Cindy Zipf, Executive Director of Clean Ocean Action, today sent separate letters to the agency stressing the need to protect the marine and coastal environment. 

The letters were sent today to Wayne Cruickshank, Acting Director of the Minerals Management Service (MMS), which has jurisdiction over energy and mineral resources at the Interior Department.  The public comment period ends today on the agency's development of regulatory programs for alternative energy exploration in the OCS, as called for in the Energy Policy Act of 2005.   The OCS includes underwater lands between three and 200 miles off the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, as well as the Gulf Coast.  Pallone opposed the Energy Policy Act of 2005 in the House last year.  

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 included a provision authorizing the Interior Department to develop a system for permitting the development of energy resources other than oil and gas on the OCS.  According to the Interior Department, the agency anticipates that the majority of applications for the development of renewable energy will include wind, wave, current and solar. 

"New Jersey's coastline is simply too important to potentially be threatened by weak offshore energy guidelines from the Bush administration," Pallone said.  "Today, I encouraged the Interior Department to create regulations that are as protective as possible of our  marine and coastal environment, and that recognize the potential economic impacts of industrial accidents or other pollution."   

"For better or worse, the Energy Policy Act has entrusted the Department of Interior with czar-like authority to develop new schemes to allow for industrial uses of our vast ocean regions of the US," said Cindy Zipf, Executive Director of Clean Ocean Action.   "Gale Norton, as Secretary of the Interior, is now drafting rules to permit these industrial uses.  Today, COA joins with Congressman Pallone and many others to urge the agency to take great care in developing these rules." 

Pallone believes the regulatory framework should include a well-defined process that will allow MMS to work with other agencies, including states and any regional governance body, to account for a disruption and destruction of the benthic (seafloor) community; impacts to fish, birds and migratory marine animals; noise and vibration impacts; physical obstructions caused by the off-shore facilities; pollution from construction and operations of the off-shore facilities; and impacts to commercial and recreational fishing, water recreation, water based tourism and local property values.