Notice2025-19173
Taking and Importing Marine Mammals; Taking Marine Mammals Incidental to the Port Everglades Harbor Navigation Improvement Project, Broward County Florida
Primary source
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Published
October 1, 2025
Issuing agencies
Commerce DepartmentNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Abstract
NMFS has received a request from the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) for authorization to take small numbers of marine mammals incidental to the Port Everglades Harbor Navigation Improvement Project in Broward County, Florida, over the course of 5 years from May 2030 through May 2035. Pursuant to regulations implementing the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), NMFS is announcing receipt of the USACE's request for the development and implementation of regulations governing the incidental taking of marine mammals. NMFS invites the public to provide information, suggestions, and comments on the USACE's application and request.
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 90 Issue 188 (Wednesday, October 1, 2025)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 90, Number 188 (Wednesday, October 1, 2025)]
[Notices]
[Pages 47298-47299]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2025-19173]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
RIN 0648-XF158
Taking and Importing Marine Mammals; Taking Marine Mammals
Incidental to the Port Everglades Harbor Navigation Improvement
Project, Broward County Florida
AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.
ACTION: Notice; receipt of application for letter of authorization;
request for comments and information.
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SUMMARY: NMFS has received a request from the United States Army Corps
of Engineers (USACE) for authorization to take small numbers of marine
mammals incidental to the Port Everglades Harbor Navigation Improvement
Project in Broward County, Florida, over the course of 5 years from May
2030 through May 2035. Pursuant to regulations implementing the Marine
Mammal Protection Act (MMPA), NMFS is announcing receipt of the USACE's
request for the development and implementation of regulations governing
the incidental taking of marine mammals. NMFS invites the public to
provide information, suggestions, and comments on the USACE's
application and request.
DATES: Comments and information must be received no later than October
31, 2025.
ADDRESSES: Comments on the application should be addressed to Permits
and Conservation Division, Office of Protected Resources, National
Marine Fisheries Service. Physical comments should be sent to 1315
East-West Highway, Silver Spring, MD 20910 and electronic comments
should be sent to <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#c1889591ef87ada4aca8afa681afaea0a0efa6aeb7"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="622b36324c240e070f0b0c05220c0d03034c050d14">[email protected]</span></a>. An electronic copy of the
USACE's application may be obtained online at: <a href="https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-mammal-protection/incidental-take-authorizations-construction-activities">https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-mammal-protection/incidental-take-authorizations-construction-activities</a>. In case of problems
accessing these documents, please call the contact listed below.
Instructions: NMFS is not responsible for comments sent by any
other method, to any other address or individual, or received after the
end of the comment period. Comments received electronically, including
all attachments, must not exceed a 25-megabyte file size. Attachments
to electronic comments will be accepted in Microsoft Word or Excel or
Adobe PDF file formats only. All comments received are a part of the
public record and will generally be posted online at <a href="https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-mammal-protection/incidental-take-authorizations-construction-activities">https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-mammal-protection/incidental-take-authorizations-construction-activities</a> without change. All
personal identifying information (e.g., name, address) voluntarily
submitted by the commenter may be publicly accessible. Do not submit
confidential business information or otherwise sensitive or protected
information.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Kate Fleming, Office of Protected
Resources, NMFS, (301) 427-8401.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
[[Page 47299]]
Background
Sections 101(a)(5)(A) and (D) of the MMPA (16 U.S.C. 1361 et seq.)
direct the Secretary of Commerce (as delegated to NMFS) to allow, upon
request, the incidental, but not intentional, taking of small numbers
of marine mammals by U.S. citizens who engage in a specified activity
(other than commercial fishing) within a specified geographical region
if certain findings are made and either regulations are issued or, if
the taking is limited to harassment, a notice of a proposed
authorization is provided to the public for review.
An incidental take authorization shall be granted if NMFS finds
that the taking will have a negligible impact on the species or
stock(s), will not have an unmitigable adverse impact on the
availability of the species or stock(s) for subsistence uses (where
relevant), and if the permissible methods of taking and requirements
pertaining to the mitigation, monitoring and reporting of such takings
are set forth.
NMFS has defined ``negligible impact'' in 50 CFR 216.103 as an
impact resulting from the specified activity that cannot be reasonably
expected to, and is not reasonably likely to, adversely affect the
species or stock through effects on annual rates of recruitment or
survival.
The MMPA states that the term ``take'' means to harass, hunt,
capture, kill or attempt to harass, hunt, capture, or kill any marine
mammal.
Except with respect to certain activities not pertinent here, the
MMPA defines ``harassment'' as: any act of pursuit, torment, or
annoyance, which (i) has the potential to injure a marine mammal or
marine mammal stock in the wild (Level A harassment); or (ii) has the
potential to disturb a marine mammal or marine mammal stock in the wild
by causing disruption of behavioral patterns, including, but not
limited to, migration, breathing, nursing, breeding, feeding, or
sheltering (Level B harassment).
Summary of Request
On May 30, 2024, NMFS received an application from the USACE
requesting authorization to take marine mammals incidental to confined
underwater blasting associated with the Port Everglades Harbor
Navigation and Improvement Project in Port Everglades Harbor (Lake
Mabel, Stranahan River, and the Atlantic Ocean) in Broward County,
Florida. Following NMFS' review of the application, the USACE submitted
a revised application on August 21, 2024. After discussions between
NMFS and USACE, particularly with respect to application of the Updated
Technical Guidance (NMFS, 2024), USACE submitted subsequent revised
applications on August 1, 2025 and again on September 5, 2025. The
application was deemed adequate and complete on September 25, 2025. The
requested regulations under which we would issue the requested LOA
would be valid for 5 years, between May 2030 and May 2035. The USACE
plans to conduct confined underwater blasting to deepen and widen the
Port Everglades harbor and entrance channel. Blasting may incidentally
expose three species of marine mammals to elevated levels of noise
resulting in take by Level A harassment and Level B harassment.
Therefore, the USACE requests authorization to incidentally take marine
mammals. Due to the proposed mitigation and monitoring measures, USACE
has not requested that NMFS authorize take by mortality or serious
injury from exposure to blasting.
NMFS notes USACE previously submitted an application to NMFS for
authorization to take marine mammals incidental to the same project (87
FR 27990, May 10, 2022); however, the application available for public
comment here supersedes that 2022 application.
Specified Activities
The USACE is planning to deepen and widen Port Everglades Harbor
using confined underwater blasting in areas where dredging or other
rock removal methods are expected to be unsuccessful. Blasting would
involve the use of conventional (high) explosive materials to breakup
rock substrate in six designated areas in the harbor and entrance
channel: the Outer Entrance Channel, Inner Entrance Channel, Main
Turning Basin, Widener, South Access Channel, and Turning Notch in Lake
Mabel, Stranahan River, and the Atlantic Ocean (See figure E-1 in the
application). During the 5-year effective period of the requested
regulations and LOA, if issued, blasting is expected to occur up to 6
days per week during daylight hours over approximately 280 days.
Blasting would only be implemented between March 15 through
November 15, annually, to comply with in-water work windows designed to
protect West Indian Manatees (Trichecus manatus) which are listed under
the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) and are under the jurisdiction of
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The USACE has requested take, by
Level B harassment and Level A harassment, of bottlenose dolphins
(Tursiops truncatus), Tamanend's bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops
erebennus), and Atlantic spotted dolphins (Stenella frontalis). The
USACE's application contains proposed mitigation and monitoring
measures designed to reduce impacts to marine mammals and avoid
mortality or serious injury.
USACE also plans to install a bulkhead comprised of sheet piles in
the South Access Channel and Turning Notch using impact driving.
However, the USACE has determined that take can be avoided through the
implementation of mitigation and monitoring measures such as bubble
curtains, shutdown zones, and Protected Species Observers, and
therefore has not requested authorization to take marine mammals
incidental to this activity. Other components of the project the USACE
has determined would not result in the take of marine mammals include
drilling blast holes at night, use of alternative rock pre-treatment
equipment such as rock breaking chisels, punch barges, clamshell bucket
drops, and terrestrial-based activities (e.g., relocation of a land-
based Coast Guard station).
Information Solicited
Interested persons may submit information, suggestions, and
comments concerning the USACE's request (see ADDRESSES). NMFS will
consider all information, suggestions, and comments related to the
request during the development of proposed regulations governing the
incidental taking of marine mammals by the USACE, if appropriate.
Dated: September 26, 2025.
Kimberly Damon-Randall,
Director, Office of Protected Resources, National Marine Fisheries
Service.
[FR Doc. 2025-19173 Filed 9-30-25; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-P
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