President exempts US Navy from environmental restrictions in Calif. training zone

In a highly controversial case, the US Navy played its trump card today as the President issued an order exempting the service from environmental laws and granted it permission to use sonar in training operations off the coast of California. At issue was the need to protect whales and dolphins from mid-frequency active sonar that could harm them, experts said.  

In a release, the Navy said that in accordance with the provisions of the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA), and at the recommendation of the Secretary of Commerce, the President concluded that continuing these vital exercises without the restrictions imposed by the district court is in the paramount interests of the United States. President Bush signed an exemption from the requirements of the CZMA for the Navy's continued use of mid-frequency active sonar in a series of exercises scheduled to take place off the coast of California through January 2009.   

The Navy said it already applies twenty-nine mitigation measures approved by federal environmental regulators when using active sonar, and these will remain in place. According to the Navy, those measures, developed in cooperation with the National Marine Fisheries Service, include, among other things, stationing specially trained lookouts to look for marine mammals, passive acoustic monitoring for marine mammals, establishing safety zones around ships where sonar power is reduced or shut down if marine mammals are sighted, and employing extra precautions during chokepoint exercises. 

The Navy said a federal court earlier this month imposed untenable restrictions on such training and just yesterday said it wouldn’t back off those rulings. The Federal Judge, in the contentious case, Florence Marie Cooper,  told the Los Angeles Times she tried to balance national security needs with environmental protections -- specifically those to prevent unnecessary harm to whales and dolphins from mid-frequency active sonar. That's the type the Navy uses to detect quiet diesel-electric submarines.

She has cited scientific studies linking U.S. and NATO warships' use of sonar to the deaths and injuries of beaked whales and other marine mammals. She also has reiterated the Navy's own predictions that the upcoming exercises off Southern California "will cause widespread harm to nearly 30 species of marine mammals." 

Cooper has closed some whale-rich waters to training exercises and insisted that the Navy increase its efforts to watch for whales and shut down the sonar if marine mammals come within 2,200 yards, according to the LA Times article. 

 The environmental group, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), that had sued the Navy and the California Coastal Commission, a state agency that ruled last year that the Navy's plans to protect marine mammals were too limited already have challenged the exemption and said the organizations would "vigorously" contest the White House orders in court. 

“The President’s action is an attack on the rule of law,” said Joel Reynolds, director of the Marine Mammal Protection Project at NRDC, in a statement.  “By exempting the Navy from basic safeguards under both federal and state law, the President is flouting the will of Congress, the decision of the California Coastal Commission, and a ruling by the federal court.” 

The Navy had already received a federal exemption from the Marine Mammal Protection Act for the exercises, which are scheduled to continue through January, 2009, but the NRDC and other groups filed suit under other environmental laws, according to a Washington Post article.   

The Navy will still have to convince federal judges that the exemptions are legal. The NRDC said this morning that such waivers are not allowed under the National Environmental Protection Act, which it said does not have an "escape clause" allowing exemptions. Both the coastal zone and marine mammal protection acts do allow for waivers, the Post said.  

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