NOAA NEPA Document Database

The proposed action would prohibit the use of trawl nets, purse seines, and trammel nets for all fishing in federal waters around Puerto Rico, St. Croix, and St. Thomas/St. John, prohibit the use of gillnets for all fishing except for the use of surface gillnets that meet specified requirements for the harvest of non-federally managed fish species in federal waters around Puerto Rico, St. Croix, and St. Thomas/St. John, and require that descending devices are available and ready for use when fishing for reef fish species managed by the Caribbean Fishery Management Council in federal waters around the U.S. Caribbean.

"The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s) National Marine Fisheries 
Service (NOAA Fisheries) West Coast Region is developing a programmatic environmental impact statement (PEIS), in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), to analyze the potential impacts to the human environment that may occur should projects be proposed in one or more Aquaculture Opportunity Areas (AOAs), in federal waters of Southern California and to evaluate the impacts of siting aquaculture in those locations. The intent of this PEIS is to support long-term planning for offshore aquaculture. This PEIS considers a long-term planning effort that is not a regulatory or permitting action and does not propose to authorize or permit any specific aquaculture-related activities or propose to approve any individual aquaculture projects."

The Washington Department of Wish and Wildlife and the Puget Sound Treaty Tribes are submitting a resource management plan (RMP) that is a 10-year framework for managing salmon and steelhead harvest in the Puget Sound area. The plan sets management measures around the Puget Sound Chinook ESU, which is listed as threatened in the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The NMFS Federal Action is to determine whether the RMP meets the requirements of ESA.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is proposing changes to regulations to implement the binding International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas Recommendation 24-12 on mobulid rays of the family Mobulidae, which was adopted in 2024. Specifically, NMFS is considering alternatives to: (1) prohibit retention of mobulid rays, and (2) implement handling and release practices. NMFS is taking this action consistent with the Atlantic Tunas Convention Act, section 971d, and the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, including section 305(d).

This action would establish area-based gear requirements for vessels fishing in the monkfish and spiny dogfish fisheries with gillnets in order to reduce bycatch of Atlantic sturgeon in these fisheries. This action is necessary to minimize bycatch of Atlantic sturgeon in the monkfish and spiny dogfish fisheries to the extent practicable and fulfill requirements of the May 27, 2021 Biological Opinion on Ten Fishery Management Plans in the Greater Atlantic Region and the New England Fishery Management Council’s Omnibus Habitat Amendment 2.

This Environmental Assessment analyzes the environmental impacts of the National Marine Fisheries Service, Office of Protected Resources’ decision regarding issuance of Incidental Harassment Regulations, pursuant to section 101(a)(5)(A) of the Marine Mammal Protection Act, to Hilcorp Alaska, LLC for oil and gas activities in Cook Inlet, Alaska

"This environmental impact statement (EIS) evaluates the environmental consequences of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) issuing incidental take permits (ITPs) associated with the Elliott State Research Forest Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), in accordance with section 10(a)(1)(B) of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973, as amended. The Oregon Department of State Lands (DSL) prepared the HCP in support of its permit applications. DSL is seeking take authorization from FWS and NMFS for three species: northern spotted owl, marbled murrelet, and Oregon Coast coho. The permits, if issued, would authorize take of the covered species that may occur incidental to DSL’s forest management and research activities on 83,326 acres of forest lands in Douglas and Coos Counties overseen by the State Land
Board. The EIS presents effects of the proposed HCP and three alternatives on geology and soils, water resources, vegetation, fish and wildlife, air quality, climate change, recreation and visual resources, cultural resources, tribal resources, socioeconomics, and environmental justice. FWS, as the federal lead agency, prepared this EIS pursuant to the Services’ NEPA requirements under the Council on Environmental Quality’s regulations (40 CFR 1500–1508, May 2022), as well as
internal agency guidance. FWS and NMFS will make separate decisions on whether to issue an ITP to the applicant, relying on the criteria for ITPs set forth in ESA and its implementing regulations."