Department of Environmental Science and Policy, George Mason University, 4400 University Drive, Fairfax, VA, 22030, U.S.A.
Conserv Biol. 2015 Apr;29(2):333-40. doi: 10.1111/cobi.12425. Epub 2014 Nov 29.
Human pressure on the environment is expanding and intensifying, especially in coastal and offshore areas. Major contributors to this are the current push for offshore renewable energy sources, which are thought of as environmentally friendly sources of power, as well as the continued demand for petroleum. Human disturbances, including the noise almost ubiquitously associated with human activity, are likely to increase the incidence, magnitude, and duration of adverse effects on marine life, including stress responses. Stress responses have the potential to induce fitness consequences for individuals, which add to more obvious directed takes (e.g., hunting or fishing) to increase the overall population-level impact. To meet the requirements of marine spatial planning and ecosystem-based management, many efforts are ongoing to quantify the cumulative impacts of all human actions on marine species or populations. Meanwhile, regulators face the challenge of managing these accumulating and interacting impacts with limited scientific guidance. We believe there is scientific support for capping the level of impact for (at a minimum) populations in decline or with unknown statuses. This cap on impact can be facilitated through implementation of regular application cycles for project authorization or improved programmatic and aggregated impact assessments that simultaneously consider multiple projects. Cross-company collaborations and a better incorporation of uncertainty into decision making could also help limit, if not reduce, cumulative impacts of multiple human activities. These simple management steps may also form the basis of a rudimentary form of marine spatial planning and could be used in support of future ecosystem-based management efforts.
人类对环境的压力正在扩大和加剧，特别是在沿海和近海地区。造成这种情况的主要原因是目前对海上可再生能源的大力推动，这些能源被认为是环保的电力来源，以及对石油的持续需求。人类的干扰，包括与人类活动几乎普遍相关的噪音，很可能会增加对海洋生物的不利影响的发生率、幅度和持续时间，包括应激反应。应激反应有可能对个体的适应能力产生影响，这会增加更明显的定向捕捞（例如，狩猎或捕鱼），从而增加总体种群水平的影响。为了满足海洋空间规划和基于生态系统的管理的要求，许多努力正在进行中，以量化所有人类活动对海洋物种或种群的累积影响。与此同时，监管机构面临着管理这些累积和相互作用的影响的挑战，而科学指导有限。我们认为，有科学依据可以限制（至少）处于下降或状态不明的种群所受影响的程度。可以通过定期申请项目授权的实施周期，或者通过同时考虑多个项目的改进的计划和综合影响评估，来实现这种影响上限。跨公司合作和更好地将不确定性纳入决策过程也有助于限制（如果不是减少）多种人类活动的累积影响。这些简单的管理步骤也可能构成海洋空间规划的基本形式，并可用于支持未来基于生态系统的管理工作。
