Department of Commerce November 25, 2022 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Ocean Service has prepared a final programmatic environmental impact statement (PEIS) in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, as amended (NEPA), to analyze the potential environmental impacts associated with NOS' recurring data collection projects to characterize submerged features (e.g., habitat, bathymetry, marine debris). The ``action area'' for these projects encompasses the United States (U.S.) territorial sea, the contiguous zone, the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone (U.S. EEZ), U.S. rivers, States' offshore waters, and coastal and riparian lands. As part of the Proposed Action, NOS may use active acoustic equipment such as sub-bottom profilers, single beam and multibeam echo sounders, side-scan sonars, and Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers. The Final PEIS analyzes NOS data collection projects for a time period of five years. In preparing the Final PEIS, NOS has considered public comments received on the Draft PEIS, which was published in June 2021.

On October 26, 2022, NMFS published a proposed rule, with a 30-day public comment period ending November 25, 2022, in response to a request by Ocean Wind, LLC (Ocean Wind) for regulations and associated Letter of Authorization (LOA), pursuant to the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), that would authorize the take of marine mammals, by Level A harassment and Level B harassment, incidental to the Ocean Wind Offshore Wind Energy Project (Ocean Wind 1), offshore of New Jersey. In response to a request, NMFS is announcing an extension of the public comment period by an additional 15 days ending on December 10, 2022.