Underwater acoustic impacts of shipping management measures: Results from a social-ecological model of boat and whale movements in the St. Lawrence River Estuary (Canada)

Chion, Clément; Lagrois, Dominic; Dupras, Jérôme; Turgeon, Stéphanie; McQuinn, Ian H.; Michaud, Robert; Ménard, Nadia; Parrott, Lael

doi:10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2017.03.014

Cited by 33 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…This will support ongoing management processes seeking to understand and mitigate the ships' radiated noise. This work will also be informative for the noise modeling endeavors carried out in the context of environmental impact assessment (e.g., Chion et al, 2017;Pennucci and Jiang, 2018).…”

Section: Objectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even though a variability exists from one study to another, a large consensus seems established in the scientific community that speed reduction does indeed favors a decrease of the noise budget attributed to the merchant fleet (e.g., Audoly et al, 2017). However, this reduction of the instantaneous underwater noise radiated comes at the expense of an increase of the time spent by ships in a speed-restricted zone, hence potentially exposing nearby marine mammals to noise pollution for longer periods of time (McKenna et al, 2013;Chion et al, 2017).…”

Section: Observationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Meta-Analysis to Understand the Variability in Reported Source Levels of Noise Radiated by Ships From Opportunistic Studies

2019

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Background: Commercial shipping is identified as a major source of anthropogenic underwater noise in several ecologically sensitive areas. Any development project likely to increase marine traffic can thus be required to assess environmental impacts of underwater noise. Therefore, project holders are increasingly engaging in underwater noise modeling relying on ships' underwater noise source levels published in the literature. However, a lack of apparent consensus emerges from the scientific literature as discrepancies up to 30 dB are reported for ships' broadband source levels belonging to the same vessel class and operating under similar conditions. We present a statistical meta-analysis of individual ships' broadband source levels available in the literature so far to identify which factors likely explain these discrepancies. Methods: We collated ships' source levels from the published literature to construct our dataset. A Generalized Linear Mixed Model was applied to the dataset to statistically assess the contribution of intrinsic (i.e., related to ships' static and dynamic attributes) and extrinsic factors (i.e., related to both the protocol for hydroacoustic data acquisition and the noise data reduction procedure) to the reported broadband source levels. Results: Amongst intrinsic factors, ships' speed-over-ground 15.39 dB × log 10 v 1 knot , p-value < 0.001 , ships' width 12.03 dB × log 10 b 1 m ; p-value < 0.001 , and ships' class (−6.07 to 2.08 dB; p-value ∈ [< 0.001 to 0.036]) have shown the strongest correlations with broadband source levels. The hydrophone-to-source closest point of approach-4.83 dB × CPA 1 nmi ; p-value < 0.001 and the correction for surface-image reflections (21.73 dB; p-value = 0.002) contribute the most to explain the reported ships' broadband source levels' variability amongst extrinsic factors. Conclusions: Our meta-analysis confirms a consensus that speed regulation can effectively reduce instantaneous ships' source levels. Neglecting Lloyd's mirror effects through the abuse of non-corrected spreading laws for propagation loss directly leads to a generalized underestimation of the ships' source levels retrieved from the literature. This could eventually be addressed by a wider adoption of standardized methods of hydrophone-based sound recordings and of data processing to homogenize results and facilitate their interpretation to conduct environmental impact assessment.

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Section: Objectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Observationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Meta-Analysis to Understand the Variability in Reported Source Levels of Noise Radiated by Ships From Opportunistic Studies

2019

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“…In ecology, the automated analysis of animal sounds can be used for individual animal detection [6], species detection [7,8], location of animal detection [9][10][11] and population monitoring [6,12 -14]. In conservation, it is useful when verifying if human activities such as shipping or seismic survey vessels affect wild animal behaviour [15][16][17][18][19]. Vocalizations of some species such as goats (Capra hircus) and horses (Equus caballus) also differ during positive and negative experiences [20 -23].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automated bioacoustics: methods in ecology and conservation and their potential for animal welfare monitoring

Mcloughlin

Stewart

McElligott

2019

J. R. Soc. Interface.

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Vocalizations carry emotional, physiological and individual information. This suggests that they may serve as potentially useful indicators for inferring animal welfare. At the same time, automated methods for analysing and classifying sound have developed rapidly, particularly in the fields of ecology, conservation and sound scene classification. These methods are already used to automatically classify animal vocalizations, for example, in identifying animal species and estimating numbers of individuals. Despite this potential, they have not yet found widespread application in animal welfare monitoring. In this review, we first discuss current trends in sound analysis for ecology, conservation and sound classification. Following this, we detail the vocalizations produced by three of the most important farm livestock species: chickens ( Gallus gallus domesticus ), pigs ( Sus scrofa domesticus ) and cattle ( Bos taurus ). Finally, we describe how these methods can be applied to monitor animal welfare with new potential for developing automated methods for large-scale farming.

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“…The issue of masking has been widely discussed and recognised, with the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) adopting guidelines to reduce underwater noise from commercial ships(IMO, 2014) and the marine industry trialling mitigation strategies to reduce noise effects on sensitive marine life (Chion et al, 2017;Constantine et al, 2015;POAL, 2015;POV, 2017). Management of marine shipping has been discussed in an Arctic context by the Arctic Council(ArcticCouncil, 2015), with modification of vessel operations through areas of high marine mammal densities and vessel slowdowns being suggested as possible measures to mitigate vessel noise effects (ArcticCouncil, 2015;Chion et al, 2017;Huntington et al, 2015). Vessel slowdown is becoming increasingly attractive in areas where re-routing shipping corridors is not possible, particularly as it can also reduce the risk of ship strike (Chion et al, 2017;Constantine et al, 2015).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Management of marine shipping has been discussed in an Arctic context by the Arctic Council(ArcticCouncil, 2015), with modification of vessel operations through areas of high marine mammal densities and vessel slowdowns being suggested as possible measures to mitigate vessel noise effects (ArcticCouncil, 2015;Chion et al, 2017;Huntington et al, 2015). Vessel slowdown is becoming increasingly attractive in areas where re-routing shipping corridors is not possible, particularly as it can also reduce the risk of ship strike (Chion et al, 2017;Constantine et al, 2015). Furthermore, slowing vessels reduces emitted noise levels and consequently decreases masking for marine mammals and fish (Putland, Merchant, Farcas, & Radford, 2017).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing vessel slowdown for reducing auditory masking for marine mammals and fish of the western Canadian Arctic

Pine

Hannay²,

Insley

et al. 2018

Marine Pollution Bulletin

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Vessel slowdown may be an alternative mitigation option in regions where rerouting shipping corridors to avoid important marine mammal habitat is not possible. We investigated the potential relief in masking from a 10 knot speed reduction of container and cruise ships. Based on ambient sound measurements and real shipping noise data, the percentage reduction in the available listening space for marine mammals and fish as a container or cruise ship passes under varying speeds and ambient sound conditions was estimated. The mitigation effect from slower vessels, in terms of masking, was not equal between ambient sound conditions, species or vessel-type. At short distances from vessels, the available listening space, relative to ambient noise conditions, was reduced most for bearded and ringed seals, followed by bowhead whales, beluga whales and then Arctic cod. Vessel slowdown through sensitive habitat could be an effective mitigation strategy for reducing the extent of auditory masking.

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Underwater acoustic impacts of shipping management measures: Results from a social-ecological model of boat and whale movements in the St. Lawrence River Estuary (Canada)

Cited by 33 publications

References 29 publications

A Meta-Analysis to Understand the Variability in Reported Source Levels of Noise Radiated by Ships From Opportunistic Studies

A Meta-Analysis to Understand the Variability in Reported Source Levels of Noise Radiated by Ships From Opportunistic Studies

Automated bioacoustics: methods in ecology and conservation and their potential for animal welfare monitoring

Assessing vessel slowdown for reducing auditory masking for marine mammals and fish of the western Canadian Arctic

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