[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 51 (Wednesday, March 16, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 14095-14096]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-05886]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
RIN 0648-XC969
Draft Guidance for Assessing the Effects of Anthropogenic Sound
on Marine Mammal Hearing--Acoustic Threshold Levels for Onset of
Permanent and Temporary Threshold Shifts
AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.
ACTION: Notice; request for comments.
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SUMMARY: The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), on behalf of
NMFS and the National Ocean Service (referred collectively here as the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)), announces the
availability of a document containing proposed changes to its Draft
Guidance for Assessing the Effects of Anthropogenic Sound on Marine
Mammal Hearing. The Guidance provides updated received levels, or
thresholds, at which individual marine mammals under NOAA's management
authority are predicted to experience changes in their hearing
sensitivity (either temporary or permanent) for all underwater
anthropogenic sound sources. NOAA has re-evaluated and modified several
parts of the Draft Guidance and is soliciting public comment on the
proposed changes.
DATES: Comments must be received by March 30, 2016.
ADDRESSES: The proposed changes to the Draft Guidance are available in
electronic form via the Internet at http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/acoustics/.
You may submit comments, which should be identified with NOAA-NMFS-
2013-0177, by either of the following methods:
Electronic Submissions: Submit all electronic public comments via
the Federal eRulemaking Portal http://www.regulations.gov.
Mail: Send comments to: Chief, Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle
Conservation Division, Office of Protected Resources, National Marine
Fisheries Service, 1315 East-West Highway, Silver Spring, MD 20910-
3226, Attn: Acoustic Guidance.
Instructions: All comments received are a part of the public record
and will generally be posted to http://www.regulations.gov without
change. All Personal Identifying Information (e.g., name, address,
etc.) voluntarily submitted by the commenter may be publicly
accessible. Do not submit Confidential Business Information or
otherwise sensitive or protected information.
NMFS will accept anonymous comments (enter N/A in the required
fields if you wish to remain anonymous). You may submit attachments to
electronic comments in Microsoft Word, Excel, WordPerfect, or Adobe PDF
file formats only.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Amy Scholik-Schlomer, Office of
Protected Resources, 301-427-8449, [email protected].
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: NOAA has developed Draft Guidance for
assessing the effects of anthropogenic sound on the hearing of marine
mammal species under NOAA's jurisdiction (i.e., whales, dolphins,
porpoises, seals and sea lions). Specifically, the Guidance, which is
technical in nature, identifies the received levels, or thresholds, at
which individual marine mammals are
[[Page 14096]]
predicted to experience changes in their hearing sensitivity (either
temporary or permanent) for all underwater anthropogenic sound sources.
This Guidance is intended to be used by NOAA analysts and managers and
other relevant user groups and stakeholders, including other federal
agencies, when seeking to determine whether and how their activities
are expected to result in particular types of impacts to marine mammals
via acoustic exposure. The document outlines NOAA's updated acoustic
threshold levels, describes in detail how the thresholds were
developed, and explains how we intend to update them in the future.
NOAA first published a Federal Register Notice on December 27,
2013, announcing the availability of the Draft Guidance and a 30-day
public comment period (78 FR 78822), which was extended another 45 days
based upon public request (79 FR 4672; January 29, 2014). While NOAA
was in the process of evaluating and addressing public comments, the
U.S. Navy updated its methodology for the development of marine mammal
auditory weighting functions and acoustic threshold levels. NOAA
evaluated the proposed methodology and determined that it reflected the
best available science. As a result, NOAA incorporated the Navy's
methodology into our Draft Guidance and conducted another 45-day public
comment period (80 FR 45642; July 31, 2015). Please refer to these
Federal Register Notices for additional background about the 2013 and
2015 Draft Guidance.
While NOAA was working to address public comments from the second
public comment period and finalize the Guidance, NOAA and the Navy
(SPAWAR Systems Center Pacific) further evaluated certain aspects of
the U.S. Navy's methodology. As a result, several recommendations/
modifications were suggested.
The recommendations include: An updated methodology for predicting
a composite audiogram for LF cetaceans; modification of the methodology
used to establish auditory threshold levels for LF cetaceans; movement
of the white-beaked dolphin (Lagenorhynchus albirostris) from mid-
frequency (MF) to high-frequency (HF) cetaceans; the inclusion of a
newly published harbor porpoise (HF cetacean) audiogram (Kastelein et
al. 2015); the exclusion of multiple data sets from the phocid pinniped
weighting function; removal of peak sound pressure level (PK) acoustic
threshold levels for non-impulsive sounds; and updated methodology for
deriving PK acoustic threshold levels for functional hearing groups
where no data are available.
After consideration of these recommendations, NOAA has updated the
Draft Guidance to reflect the suggested changes and is soliciting
public comment on those revisions, which have been placed in a stand-
alone document, via a focused 14-day public comment period. As the
Guidance is finalized, NOAA will address all substantive public
comments on the Guidance (i.e., from the first and second public
comment periods, as well as those from this focused third public
comment period). Accordingly, there is no need to reiterate or resubmit
comments made during the first and second public comment period on
other sections of the Draft Guidance. NOAA encourages the public to
focus comment on the document containing the proposed changes to the
Guidance.
The Guidance is classified as a Highly Influential Scientific
Assessment by the Office of Management and Budget. As such, independent
peer review is required prior to broad public dissemination by the
Federal Government. As part of this process, NOAA has conducted three
independent peer reviews in association with the Guidance. Details of
all peer reviews can be found within the Guidance and at the following
Web site: http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/acoustics/ acoustics/. Concurrent with this
third public comment period, NOAA requested that the peer reviewers of
the Navy's methodology review the document containing the proposed
changes to the Draft Guidance and indicate whether the revisions would
significantly alter any of the comments made during their original
review.
Dated: March 10, 2016.
Donna S. Wieting,
Director, Office of Protected Resources, National Marine Fisheries
Service.
[FR Doc. 2016-05886 Filed 3-15-16; 8:45 am]
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