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NOAA Sea Grant-funded research and work with coastal and Great Lakes communities across the nation are being highlighted in a special issue of “Oceanography,” the official journal of The Oceanography Society.
This special issue, published in April 2024, features 36 articles contributed by Sea Grant authors across 29 programs and the NOAA National Sea Grant Office.
Year-over-year, Sea Grant is committed to supporting aquaculture development across the nation, as a means of enhancing economic resilience and nutritional security in American communities. Sea Grant recently developed a five-year Aquaculture Investment Plan to guide its efforts in supporting aquaculture research, extension and education.
At its recent biennial meeting in San Diego, California, the Sea Grant Extension Assembly awarded its William Q. Wick Award for Visionary Career Leadership. Learn about the winner and nominees.
Sea Grant announces $19 million in federal funding opportunities to address the prevention and removal of marine debris. These opportunities are a component of nearly $3 billion in targeted investments for NOAA in the areas of habitat restoration, coastal resilience and weather forecasting infrastructure through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
Contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) are increasingly detected in surface water and groundwater, posing risks to the Nation’s drinking waters and aquatic life. Over the last three years, Sea Grant has been building its CEC-focused research portfolio and supporting projects that serve locally-derived information needs.
NOAA Sea Grant is pleased to announce the selection of 10 projects through two competitions aimed at bolstering workforce development efforts in both the wild-caught fisheries and aquaculture sectors.
For the second time, NOAA’s National Sea Grant College Program and Office of Response and Restoration’s (OR&R) Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) have partnered to competitively solicit and select projects to support innovative all-hazard preparedness, response, and recovery initiatives for coastal communities.
NOAA’s National Sea Grant College Program (Sea Grant), in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Water Power Technologies Office, is supporting three projects in Alaska, Guam, and Hawaiʻi that will examine how adoption of ocean renewable energy could support sustainable energy systems.
The Sea Grant network, with support from the National Sea Grant Office, will lead a special issue of Oceanography, a quarterly journal of The Oceanography Society. The special issue is planned to be released in Spring 2024.
NOAA Sea Grant and NOAA Fisheries Office of Aquaculture are pleased to announce the publication of an agency-wide Programmatic Environmental Assessment that analyzes the potential impacts on the natural and human environment from aquaculture research and development projects funded by federal financial assistance awards.
NOAA Sea Grant is pleased to announce $27 million in projects that will address the prevention and removal of debris in marine and Great Lakes environments throughout the U.S. Using Sea Grant’s partnered approach to bring science together with communities for solutions that work, the projects will support transformational research and the creation of local coalitions to address urgent marine debris prevention and removal needs.
Adding farmed seafood to your plate is a great way to go green! This Earth Week, Al Roker and NBC’s Today show profiled aquaculture, or seafood farming, as part of their climate solution coverage.
Ambulance chaser. Ruthless. Heartless. Greedy. Lawyers tend to be seen as villains, but the daily work of most lawyers is a far cry from what we see on television. Today, on International Be Kind to Lawyers Day, we want to take a moment to recognize the work of one of the most unique programs in the Sea Grant Network – the National Sea Grant Law Center.
Those interested in monitoring shoreline change in their communities have a new resource to help them get started – a web-based inventory of citizen science efforts to track coastal change in the U.S. The site, Communities Tracking Coastal Change, was created by NOAA Climate Program Office’s Coastal Inundation Risk Team and Woods Hole Sea Grant.
Georgia Sea Grant secured funding from the Department of Defense and the National Sea Grant College Program to hire Michelle Covi as the country’s first Coastal Resilience DOD Liaison in 2021. For the last year, Covi has created a suite of reports and resources that are now being used by Sea Grant programs, military installations, and coastal resilience specialists across the region to inform collaborative resilience projects.
Through a joint competition with the U.S. Coastal Research Program (USCRP), ten new projects were selected for a total of $3.9 million in funding to translate research into application for communities. Additionally, Sea Grant programs across the nation received an additional total of $4.2 million in NOAA Sea Grant funds to increase local capacity, engagement, research, and implementation for addressing resilience challenges.
NOAA is developing a Programmatic Environmental Assessment to analyze the potential impacts on the natural and human environment from aquaculture research and development projects funded by federal financial assistance awards. A public comment period for the draft Programmatic Environmental Assessment is open now through December 18, 2022.
Sea Grant announces $1.2 million in support of Sea Grant’s American Lobster Research Program to continue addressing emergent needs and priorities associated with this important fishery. Pursuant to congressional direction, this year’s funded projects shift focus on operational needs, specifically related to gear technology implementation, research and adoption.
Four Connecticut cities have joined a pilot project to boost community participation in climate change planning. Community activities in Bridgeport, New Haven, New London and Norwich are being led by Connecticut Sea Grant with support from NOAA, and will focus on climate risk communication and planning for community resilience.
NOAA Sea Grant today announced approximately $14 million in federal funding across four strategic areas for improving U.S. aquaculture. The competitively selected projects will advance early stage propagation strategies for various aquaculture species, marine finfish juvenile production technologies, aquaculture collaboratives and establishment of an aquaculture information exchange.
Hurricanes. Flood events. Oil spills. When disaster strikes, communities come together to respond. NOAA Sea Grant and NOAA’s Disaster Preparedness Program are partnering to help communities respond to and recover from these occurrences through three projects that strengthen local preparedness measures.
Community planners and decision makers now have an application guide to help them plan for the significant sea level rise the United States is expected to see in the next 30 years. The guide is a response to the 2022 Interagency Sea Level Rise report, which projected about a foot of higher waters, on average, along U.S. coastlines by 2050.
The Northeast Sea Grant Consortium—in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Wind Energy Technologies Office and Water Power Technologies Office, and NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center—today announced six projects to advance social science and technology research on offshore renewable energy in the Northeast United States. This funding opportunity, which awarded over $1.1 million in federal funds, seeks to catalyze research for the coexistence of marine energy—including wind, current, tidal, and wave energies—with Northeast fishing and coastal communities.
In honor of Women’s History Month, get to know one of the many Women of Sea Grant, Renee Collini. Renee is a Coastal Climate Resilience Specialist with Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, Florida Sea Grant and Mississippi State University.
Questions poured in by the dozen after the morning session of the 2015 Adapt CT legal workshop—six pages worth, in fact. The workshop was part of a series on climate adaptation hosted by Connecticut Sea Grant and the UConn Center for Land Use Education and Research, known as CLEAR, through their joint organization Adapt CT. Legal issues had starkly emerged as another area being reshaped by the broad sweep of the changing climate, as effects are felt across fisheries, agriculture, health, infrastructure, wildlife and economies.
The National Sea Grant Office announced funding for the Recirculating Aquaculture Salmon Network (RAS-N) in 2019. While that three-year grant is now winding down, the collaborative network it helped build is not going away. Rather, it is entering an exciting new phase with $10 million in funding from a U.S. Department Agriculture program designed to enhance sustainability in agriculture.
Sea Grant announces $2 million in support of the Sea Grant American Lobster Initiative to address scientific and stakeholder needs associated with this important fishery. This is Sea Grant’s third year of research and extension funding to address critical gaps in knowledge about how American lobster is being impacted by environmental change in the Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank and southern New England.
Just offshore of New Castle, New Hampshire, Sea Grant researchers are teaming up with local fishermen and farmers to create a new model for sustainable, small-scale finfish aquaculture: The AquaFort.
The Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium has announced a new two-year project that will develop a roadmap for Sea Grant water resources initiatives and improve communication and coordination on water resources efforts within the network and among key partners. Karen Bareford, of the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium and The University of Alabama’s Alabama Water Institute, will serve as the Sea Grant Water Resources Lead.
The National Sea Grant College Program has announced that a regional collaborative of Sea Grant fisheries extension specialists, university scientists and fisheries managers will receive $2.4 million to develop and implement extension and outreach programming related to data and information from three large research projects focused on estimating the number of reef fish in the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico.
Sea Grant announced three initiatives today, all of which focus on freshwater systems and management. Projects include examining contaminants of emerging concern along the East Coast, mitigating pollution resulting from runoff in the mid-Atlantic, and managing stormwater to reduce flooding in the Great Lakes.
NOAA’s National Sea Grant College Program and Office of Sustainable Fisheries awarded approximately $900,000 of FY21 federal funds to support projects that will initiate “Food from the Sea'' career development programs. With these funds, Sea Grant programs and partners will work collaboratively with members of the fishing industry to identify training needs and develop updated and/or new resources and programming to address those needs.
NOAA Sea Grant today announced $3.5 million in federal funding to support two efforts aiding sustainable growth of U.S. seafood, one focused on improving coordination for marine aquaculture development and another that addresses COVID-19 impacts to seafood resources.
NOAA Sea Grant and the NOAA Marine Debris Program announce the funding of six new, creative projects to tackle marine debris challenges across the country. This year’s projects focus on preventing the introduction of marine debris into marine, coastal and Great Lakes environments.
ECO Magazine’s Rising Seas explores sea level rise, its related challenges, and the solutions currently underway. In this special, digital publication, learn about NOAA’s efforts to help the country adapt to rising sea levels and see Sea Grant’s work in coastal resilience.
This summer on Bradford Beach in Milwaukee, swimmers might notice people in light blue T-shirts pushing an ice cream cart across the sand. Instead of frozen treats, the cart contains brochures and other information that beachgoers need to keep safe. The cart is part of a new Beach Ambassador Pilot Project run by Wisconsin Sea Grant, Milwaukee Water Commons, Milwaukee Riverkeeper, Coastline Services LLC and the Milwaukee Community Sailing Center.
Sea Grant is partnering with Swift Engineering on the development of a buoy like none before. Check out this multimedia feature to learn more about Sea Grant and Swift’s partnership on Kelp.
For Sea Grant, resilience is more than a buzzword. As a network of 34 university-based programs, Sea Grant brings together experts in coastal processes, hazards, climate change, and urban planning to support cutting-edge research and outreach. Sea Grant is involved in every aspect of climate resilience planning and implementation, from start to finish. Tour some of Sea Grant’s latest projects and on-going efforts to sustain diverse and vibrant coastal economies.
Several Sea Grant projects purchased farm fresh seafood originally intended for local restaurants and repurposed it to restore aquatic and marine environments. Not only did this creative solution aid in local restoration efforts but it also provided immediate relief to aquaculture producers whose sales were impacted by the pandemic.
As 2020 draws to a close, Sea Grant is reflecting on its best moments of what has been an especially challenging year. Several Sea Grant projects and people were recently recognized by the Sea Grant Association (SGA) for their exceptional work.
In 2020, Sea Grant continued to engage in hundreds of aquaculture-related projects and ongoing efforts, leveraging federal dollars well beyond the federal investment with partnerships and collaborative efforts. This year, several established projects selected in previous years received continued funding, and many new initiatives were launched.
The Sea Grant American Lobster Initiative, created in 2019, works to understand ecosystem changes affecting American lobster and share findings with regional stakeholders who can use the information to influence lobster management. This National Lobster Day (September 25) take a look at the extension and research strides made by Sea Grant’s American Lobster Initiative in its first year.
The Sea Grant Great Lakes Aquaculture Collaborative is hosting the first annual Sea Grant Great Lakes Aquaculture Day on October 10, 2020. Register now for this free, interactive, virtual event!
In a new report published by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), California Sea Grant and Alaska Sea Grant contributed a case study to highlight the approach Sea Grant extension personnel take in working with fishing communities and the seafood direct marketing information products they have created since the mid 1990s.
In a changing climate, sea-level rise, storm surge and erosion all threaten our coasts’ sandy beaches. Teams of volunteer citizen scientists from New Hampshire, Maine and California Sea Grant programs are helping researchers keep a finger on the pulse of the shifting sands.
In a study led by California Sea Grant Extension Specialist Theresa Talley, researchers found that nearly a quarter of fish sampled from a creek that flows into San Diego Bay contain microplastics. This work, which was recently published in the journal PLOS ONE, examined plastics in coastal sediments and three species of fish.
The Sea Grant Oil Spill Science Outreach Program and the Gulf Research Program (GRP) of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a series of workshops around the country – in Alabama, Alaska, California, Louisiana, and Virginia – designed to bring regional priorities to the fore in community oil spill preparation and resiliency planning. Five regional workshop reports and one summary report are now available online.
New research and innovative collaborative efforts aim to advance domestic aquaculture. Forty two new projects funded by Sea Grant in three programs will work to increase understanding and transfer knowledge to end users for different topics and geographies across the U.S.
The sun is shining and the water is calm: what better way to spend a warm summer day than dropping anchor, kicking back and casting a line? Every year, tens of millions of people flock to U.S. coasts to enjoy recreational fishing and boating. Sea Grant supports the recreational fishing and boating enthusiasts and industries by providing resources that teach people learn how to fish and boat, help boaters and anglers determine when and where to go on the water, how to get the most out of their excursions while staying safe, and how to protect the environment so future generations can enjoy the same experiences.
In Puget Sound, The Nature Conservancy in Washington wants to learn more about shellfish aquaculture structures and how they impact the marine environment for specific organisms or life stages. They partner with the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Washington Sea Grant, as well as the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe and shellfish farms, to study which fish and crab species use shellfish aquaculture habitats.
Since the 1960s, surfers from the United States have been going to Rincón, Puerto Rico to catch the best waves of the winter season. The trend has been so consistent that the town has slowly built its economy along its approximate eight miles of beautiful coastline, now famous with tourists. Yet, as the surfing community continues to swell, the beaches get crowded, and the same waves that keep the local economy afloat also put tourists and locals at risk of losing their lives.
How do people prepare for hurricanes before the season begins? When a hurricane is looming, how do people receive warning, decide to take action, and prepare for the storm? As part of the National Weather Service’s Hurricane Preparedness Week, Sea Grant programs have been highlighting their work that aims to answer these questions. Resources developed by Sea Grant and partners can help communities and individuals prepare for storms well before hurricane season even approaches as well as when a storm is approaching.
A Sea Grant team of legal and aquaculture experts has released a report detailing eight case studies that identify challenges to the shellfish aquaculture industry in the United States. The project was funded through Sea Grant’s 2017 national investment in aquaculture.
Sea Grant professionals from across the country will attend the triennial aquaculture conference in March 2019. The conference is a joint meeting of the World Aquaculture Society, National Shellfisheries Association, Fish Culture Section of the American Fisheries Society, and the National Aquaculture Association.
Sea Grant’s 2019 national aquaculture program includes three federal funding opportunities to advance priority project types.
A Wisconsin Sea Grant and National Weather Service collaborative project seeks to answer the question: Why are the economically disadvantaged more likely to be negatively affected by severe weather? It adds to the Weather Ready Nation initiative.
A new online aquaculture siting tool called MA-ShellfAST simplifies the process of selecting and establishing a shellfish farm for Massachusetts-based farmers using funding from the NOAA Sea Grant 2016 Aquaculture Extension and Technology Transfer program.
In this installment of our continuing #SeafoodMonth festivities, we look at how Sea Grant investments in research have advanced the domestic aquaculture industry.
Sea Grant Celebrates Aquaculture Week October is Seafood Month, and Sea Grant is celebrating all month long by telling some of the inspiring (and tasty!)
Recent work from Washington and Hawai’i Sea Grant programs highlights Sea Grant’s role in preparing coastal communities across the country for rising sea levels.
Even small amounts of running water—less than a gallon per second—could mean the difference between life or death for juvenile coho salmon in coastal California streams, according to a new study published in the journal Transactions of the American Fisheries Society.
Sea Grant works with coastal communities across the U.S., Puerto Rico and Guam to improve community resilience to coastal storms. Sea Grant engages in vulnerability assessments, resilience planning and social science initiatives to learn from previous storms and better prepare for future storms.
Lake Champlain Sea Grant earned the honor as an Institutional Program for demonstrating excellence in research, education and public service dedicated to the environmentally responsible management and development in the Nation’s marine, coastal and Great Lakes resources. As a Sea Grant Institute, Lake Champlain Sea Grant is eligible for additional federal funding and is expected to increase the research portfolio of the program.
Hurricane Irma displaced more than 150,000 spiny lobster traps in the Florida Keys last year, sometimes miles away from their original locations. But a novel eyes-in-the-sky solution developed with support from Florida Sea Grant has saved the industry nearly $4 million.
When the national Sea Grant office asks the network of 33 programs for examples of outstanding community outreach and collaboration, one name is often suggested: North Carolina Sea Grant’s Jack Thigpen.
Maryland Sea Grant is working to increase environmental literacy by partnering with teachers to bring aquaculture into the classroom.
The event, organized by Alaska Sea Grant and partners, aims to train the next generation of commercial fishermen to help turn the tide on Alaska’s graying fleet, where the average age of a boat captain is now 50.
USC Sea Grant has worked with communities in southern California for over six years on climate adaptation planning. They analyzed their efforts and published the analysis in the Cities and the Environment Journal.
Originally posted by Connecticut Sea Grant About 25 federal and state regulators met with current and aspiring kelp farmers at UConn’s Avery Point campus in
Knowledge, Spread Wisely: Sea Grant Evaluation Shows National Weather Service Forecast is Assisting Farmers in Protecting Wisconsin Waters
“There’s a worm on my oyster!” Louisiana Sea Grant explains why this happens and why it’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Sea Grant programs in the Gulf of Mexico and Georgia help communities better understand how to create a Program for Public Information (PPI) and earn outreach points under the National Flood Insurance Program’s Community Rating System (CRS). Points earned through the CRS help improve a community’s rating and can lead to discounted flood insurance premiums.
University of Georgia Marine Extension and Georgia Sea Grant is working with researchers from the National Center for Atmospheric Research to better understand how to communicate hurricane risks so that the public will take necessary precautions before a storm.
To fill a knowledge gap about the shallow seafloor right off Rhode Island’s coast, Rhode Island Sea Grant invested in the development of BayMap, a collection of marine habitat maps for Narragansett Bay and surrounding coastal ponds for use by resource managers and scientists.
NOAA Sea Grant announces the award of $9.3 million in grants for 32 projects to advance the development of a sustainable marine and coastal aquaculture
The day started with a typical greeting one would expect when meeting someone for the first time. As we walked towards Paul’s aging truck, which I could only describe as “having lots of character,” I knew I was about to embark on an entertaining adventure.
Louisiana Sea Grant extension agent Thu Bui translates Sea Grant resources for Vietnamese fishermen in Louisiana.
Paul C. Focazio, New York Sea Grant Five years post-Sandy, Helen Cheng says the superstorm “still looms in the memories of our stakeholders, but I’m
Sea Grant supports the advancement of sustainable aquaculture development through research, extension and education.
Sea Grant support enhances extension and technology transfer to advance aquaculture production in New Hampshire and Maine.
Sea Grant supported research, education and workforce development to help make it possible
Located at the NWC on the UA campus in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Bareford will work with community stakeholders and partners to understand what information they need to make the best decisions possible.
Georgia Sea Grant funded the development and testing of a turtle excluder device (TED) to help jellyfish trawl fishermen operate more efficiently.
Alaska Sea Grant is getting the word out about a technique that could enhance farmed oyster and kelp productivity.
A strong partnership between Louisiana and Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant programs fosters the exchange of information and problem solving for successful oyster larvae production; supports growing off-bottom aquaculture industry in the northern Gulf of Mexico.
Working waterfronts in South Carolina are hotspots for tourists to enjoy the local seafood and immerse themselves in nature. This has not always been the case, however, with most waterfronts historically focused around commercial businesses and industry. While some communities embrace this change towards a more recreational focus, others fear that commercial fishing and the “traditional identity” of the town will suffer.
Washington Sea Grant and its partners LEED the way for waterfront dwellers trying to restore their shorelines.
This guide features strategies for local governments, conservation principles and neighborhood site design, stormwater best management practices and local case studies.
Commercial fishing is one of the nation’s most dangerous occupations, nowhere more so than on the West Coast.
Maryland Sea Grant Extension Helps Shellfish Growers Produce Oyster Seed
As part of a growing effort for collaboration between the National Weather Service and Sea Grant, NOAA will hire an Integrated Water Extension Liaison housed at the National Water Center.
Salmon conservation achieved a major victory this October as construction finished on a fish passage and stream restoration project in Mill Creek, California. After California
An exchange between Texas Sea Grant and NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service is helping shrimp fishermen keep sea turtles safe and themselves on the right side of federal regulations.
Hatchery promises a comeback for commercial oyster harvests, the once thriving industry in Georgia.
NEWPORT, RI— Seaweed cultivation is a rapidly growing industry in New England, providing new economic opportunities for seaside communities and would-be sea vegetable farmers. The widespread
America’s first offshore wind farm will begin producing electricity in November. Sea Grant’s local leadership to guide the planning and community engagement process was vital to the project’s success.
by Becky Zeiber, New Hampshire Sea Grant From kelp beer to seaweed salads, the public’s appetite for sea vegetables seems to have grown exponentially over
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium helps growers refine mariculture practices, supports research on triploid oysters, and connects oyster farmer and eco-tourism company.
Wisconsin Sea Grant has worked with partners for more than 30 years to bring back a chain of barrier islands in Green Bay, Lake Michigan. It’s paying off. Rare birds are now making the emerging islands a home.
South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium offers unique opportunities for graduate students to explore a variety of options to hone their skills and land that perfect job.