NORWEGIAN fisherman Bjornar Nicolaisen issued a timely caution to the Eastern Cape in an interview published yesterday.
Backing his comments with an official report, he said seismic surveys off the Norwegian coast had had a devastating effect on fish stocks. Only some of the damage had already been measured, he said, but what was known was all bad.
A similar seismic survey is under way off the South African coast to search for mineral resources as yet undiscovered. Airguns fire underwater blasts at close intervals to create the shockwaves that scientists analyse to work out what is beneath the surface of the seabed.
Nicolaisen said the blast affected fish in a radius of up to 18km from the research site and killed everything in the immediate vicinity.
Much of the work planned for the Eastern Cape has already been completed, but the survey has a long way still to go.
We would not argue that undersea resources should be left untapped, but it is important that the search for non-renewable resources is not conducted at the permanent cost of the renewable resources that could sustain life on earth for millenia to come.
Similar caution needs to be applied in the consideration of hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, in the Karoo to release natural gas. If the process poisons ancient underground water reserves or destroys the fragile environment of the region, the damage could be felt long after the gas is exhausted.
The government already has given the go-ahead for the construction of more nuclear power stations along our coast – possible in the Eastern Cape – but further decisions need to be taken about their placement and about the technology they use.
Nuclear power is the most sustainable of the fuel-based energy technologies available and probably is an inevitable and appropriate part of our future, but its application must be designed with utmost care for the environment of our world today and that of generations still unimagined.
The generation alive today owns this planet only for a limited period. We need to do what we reasonably can to ensure a decent life for everyone within our borders, on our continent and across the globe.
But we need also to ensure that similar privileges are available for as long into the future as we are able to look back into the past.
Taking the long view need not mean we cannot harvest oil from under the sea or gas from beneath the Karoo. Nor does it mean we cannot shift the burden of our power generation from coal to nuclear.
But it does mean we need to use the science we have to live our lives in this century at the least possible cost to those who will live in centuries to come.
Our Opinion: Let’s preserve our future
Backing his comments with an official report, he said seismic surveys off the Norwegian coast had had a devastating effect on fish stocks. Only some of the damage had already been measured, he said, but what was known was all bad.
A similar seismic survey is under way off the South African coast to search for mineral resources as yet undiscovered. Airguns fire underwater blasts at close intervals to create the shockwaves that scientists analyse to work out what is beneath the surface of the seabed.
Nicolaisen said the blast affected fish in a radius of up to 18km from the research site and killed everything in the immediate vicinity.
Much of the work planned for the Eastern Cape has already been completed, but the survey has a long way still to go.
We would not argue that undersea resources should be left untapped, but it is important that the search for non-renewable resources is not conducted at the permanent cost of the renewable resources that could sustain life on earth for millenia to come.
Similar caution needs to be applied in the consideration of hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, in the Karoo to release natural gas. If the process poisons ancient underground water reserves or destroys the fragile environment of the region, the damage could be felt long after the gas is exhausted.
The government already has given the go-ahead for the construction of more nuclear power stations along our coast – possible in the Eastern Cape – but further decisions need to be taken about their placement and about the technology they use.
Nuclear power is the most sustainable of the fuel-based energy technologies available and probably is an inevitable and appropriate part of our future, but its application must be designed with utmost care for the environment of our world today and that of generations still unimagined.
The generation alive today owns this planet only for a limited period. We need to do what we reasonably can to ensure a decent life for everyone within our borders, on our continent and across the globe.
But we need also to ensure that similar privileges are available for as long into the future as we are able to look back into the past.
Taking the long view need not mean we cannot harvest oil from under the sea or gas from beneath the Karoo. Nor does it mean we cannot shift the burden of our power generation from coal to nuclear.
But it does mean we need to use the science we have to live our lives in this century at the least possible cost to those who will live in centuries to come.
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