Michelle Sanders, director general of the Innovation Center at Transport Canada<\/a> in Ottawa, says: \u201cWe need to bring everybody together to work toward a solution that will reduce the sound in our ocean to protect marine species, regardless of where the ships are operating.\u201d<\/p>\n Noise from the engine and propellers of the Nordic Odyssey caused narwhals to stop calling to each other in Eclipse Sound. Photograph: Alex Ootoowak<\/p>\n This November, members will gather at the International Maritime Organization Assembly<\/a> where a High Ambition Coalition for a Quiet Ocean<\/a> \u2013 of 37 countries representing more than 50%<\/a> of the global shipping fleet \u2013 will call for new policies to focus on the design and operation of quieter ships.<\/p>\n Action cannot come soon enough, says Halifax-based marine biologist Lindy Weilgart.<\/p>\n \u201cI have yet to find any marine species that is completely immune to noise or vibration of any kind,\u201d she says. \u201cOnce you know, you do something, now.\u201d<\/p>\n Local Inuit people were the first to notice that narwhals are particularly sensitive to ship noise. Photograph: Minden Pictures\/Alamy<\/p>\n Sound helps underwater organisms find food, communicate, navigate, avoid predators and mate. In Pacific waters, southern resident orcas<\/a> lose their salmon-hunting echolocation clicks in ship noise off Vancouver. In Atlantic waters, North Atlantic right whales<\/a> showed measurably reduced stress when ship traffic ceased after 9\/11, suggesting chronic physiological impacts of vessel noise.<\/p>\n Shipping noise, unlike other major sources of anthropogenic ocean noise pollution<\/a>, should be solvable. While seismic surveys for oil and gas exploration require powerful sound pulses to map seafloor geology, and offshore windfarm development uses pile-driving to install turbine foundations, \u201cships don\u2019t gain anything from making noise\u201d, says Weilgart.<\/p>\n The maritime industry has long recognised that underwater radiated noise is wasted energy<\/a>, says Giorgio Burella, a naval architect at Robert Allan, a Vancouver-based company that designs boats.<\/p>\n To reduce noise, vessels can reroute around sensitive marine areas or slow down. But through design, the industry can target the primary sources of ship noise, with advanced propeller designs that reduce cavitation bubbles, hull modifications that create smoother water flow and engine isolation systems that prevent machinery vibrations transmitting through the vessel into surrounding waters.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n Sign up to Global Dispatch<\/p>\n Get a different world view with a roundup of the best news, features, opinion and photography, curated by our global development team<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n However, implementing these solutions requires persistence. \u201cThe marine industry is a very conservative industry, so any changes take time,\u201d says Burella, who points to incremental progress so far, built on voluntary measures.<\/p>\n For example, the Enhancing Cetacean Habitat and Observation (Echo<\/a>) programme \u2013 a decade-long collaboration between the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority, government, Indigenous communities and shipping companies \u2013 has pioneered noise reduction measures in critical orca habitats<\/a> through voluntary vessel slowdowns and rerouting.<\/p>\n Noise reduction methods are being used to lessen the shipping disruption to orcas near Vancouver. Photograph: jonmccormackphoto\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \u201cWe were able to get a 60% voluntary participation rate, and cut the noise in half,\u201d says Melanie Knight, Echo programme manager. As the message got out, that rate increased to 90%, she says, pointing to other co-benefits: slowdowns reduced air emissions by approximately a third and lowered collision risk<\/a> for marine mammals.<\/p>\n Knight believes the future lies in designing quieter ships. \u201cWe know there is a longer-term solution that takes much more investment, time and design expertise. For the future of the whales, we need quieter ships to begin with,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Back in Eclipse Sound, Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation, which relies on cargo carriers such as the Nordic Odyssey to service its Mary River mine, last year incorporated a Silent-E designated vessel<\/a> into its fleet. The Nordic Nuluujaak is the world\u2019s first bulk carrier to receive the designation. The mining company has also implemented a range of measures<\/a>, including convoy operations \u2013 where ships travel in groups \u2013 nine-knot speed limits, and fixed shipping routes to reduce cumulative noise exposure for marine life.<\/p>\n Mads Petersen, the chief operating officer of Pangaea Logistics Solutions \u2013 the company that owns the Nordic Odyssey and the Nordic Nuluujaak \u2013 says it is working to reduce underwater noise from its fleet. \u201cThis includes working with our partners in the Arctic. With a vessel that has received the Silent-E notation, we consider the impacts of our operations in areas where there might be wildlife of any kind.\u201d<\/p>\n Baffinland has started using quieter vessels to transport cargo to its Mary River iron ore mine on Baffin Island. Photograph: All Canada Photos\/Alamy<\/p>\n But Joshua Jones, an oceanographer at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, says that even when ships operate below quiet certification standards, the noise can still disrupt highly sensitive species such as narwhals.<\/p>\n \u201cIn order to determine what\u2019s quiet, you must have a few key definitions and understand quiet. Quiet is from the reference point of a listener,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Arctic waters create unique acoustic challenges, too \u2013 colder temperatures and ice conditions require region-specific solutions. The Eclipse Sound research, led by the Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization with Scripps and Oceans North, started with Inuit observations that narwhals are sensitive to ship noise. The research<\/a> confirmed this vulnerability at 20km (12.4-mile) distances, far exceeding the 3km range previous studies had predicted.<\/p>\n \u201cHaving western science to back up the testimonies of local people has been instrumental in moulding the rules and regulations of the waters here,\u201d says Ootoowak, who would like to see all vessels entering Arctic waters take efforts to reduce their noise.<\/p>\n From cruise ships to fishing vessels to pleasure craft, comprehensive noise management requires accountability across the entire maritime fleet, says Ootoowak, because in the acoustic world of narwhals, every engine matters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The delicate clicks and whistles of narwhals carry through Tasiujaq, locally known as Eclipse Sound, at the eastern…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":282323,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":{"0":"post-282322","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-uk","10":"tag-united-kingdom","11":"tag-unitedkingdom","12":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282322","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=282322"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282322\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/282323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=282322"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=282322"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=282322"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Spectogram](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/1388.jpg\")
Spectogram shows the silencing of narwhals while a ship passes \u2013\u00a0video <\/p>\n