Purpose

In 2011, the name of the Seismic Survey Task Force was changed to Noise Task Force to acknowledge that its remit should include all aspects of the noise issue and not exclusively those related to seismic surveys.

The first Noise Task Force meeting was held in Vancouver on 13-14 November 2011 and the second just before the 11th WGWAP meeting, on 9-10 February 2012 in Geneva, Switzerland. The third Noise Task Force meeting was held, again under the chairmanship of Greg Donovan, on 2-3 November in Busan, Republic of Korea. The topics considered at this meeting included results of the monitoring and mitigation program applied to Sakhalin Energy’s 2012 2-D seismic geotechnical survey, analyses of data collected during Sakhalin Energy’s 2010 Astokh 4-D seismic survey, status of past noise recommendations, cumulative noise impacts and other issues. The final report of this meeting (NTF-3) will be posted on the WGWAP website soon.

Thanks to the support of the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), a brochure entitled Marine Seismic Surveys - Modern Approaches to Minimizing Risks in Environmentally Sensitive Areas - Sakhalin Case Study was produced. It was distributed at the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Republic of Korea in September 2012 and is posted on this website.

The fourth Noise Task Force meeting will be held on 12-13 May 2013 in Tokyo, Japan, immediately prior to the 13th WGWAP meeting.