Animal rights advocates yesterday urged the National Science Council (NSC) to revoke a license for an international collaborative project investigating seismic structural features of the earth’s crust in order to avoid harming marine life.
The activists made the appeal during a protest rally in front of the NSC in Taipei.
The council is sponsoring the Taiwan Integrated Geodynamics Research (TAIGER) project.
The earthquake study initiated by the Columbia University-affiliated Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory is a sea floor investigation project in the exclusive economic zones of Taiwan, China, Japan and the Philippines, the conservationists said.
They said that air guns, which will be used under the sea in the study, could produce a noise equivalent to 265 decibels (dB), and could be a threat to sharks and dolphins.
The US government launched an environmental impact assessment last December and established measures aimed at minimizing adverse effects on the marine ecosystem last month, the activists said.
In comparison, the NSC granted a research permit for the project without getting the results of the impact assessment, the conservationists said.
Pointing out that the NSC convened a review meeting on the project last December but refused to make public the meetings’ minutes, the activists said they should be given a chance to provide relevant information and marine experts should be allowed to express their opinion to the NSC.
In response, NSC official Cheng Chien-hong (鄭建鴻) said boats used in the experiment will be equipped with facilities to protect marine animals.
He also said marine biologists would call a halt to the firing of air guns any time that noise limits are breached.
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SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
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